mm3 








LETTERS 



YOUNG MEN, 



FOUNDED ON THE 



HISTOEY OF JOSEPH. 



EY 



WILLIAM B. SPRAGUE, D. D, 



OP ALBANY. 




SEVENTH 'EDITION. 



ALBAN Y: 
PUBLISHED BY E. H. PEASE & Co. 

1851. 



?% 



Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1845, by 

ERASTTJS H. PEASE, 
In the Clerk's Office of the Northern District of New- York. 






CONTENTS. 



Page. 
Outline of the history of Joseph, ...... 7 



PART I. 

SOURCES OF DANGER TO YOUNG MEN. 

LETTER I. 
Danger from excessive parental indulgence, . . 29 

LETTER IL 
Danger from injurious treatment, 38 

LETTER III. 

Danger from living away from home, ..... 47 



IV CONTENTS. 

LETTER IV. 

Page, 
Danger from living in a corrupt state of society, . 58 

LETTER V. 

Danger from being suddenly cast into adversity, . 71 

LETTER VI. 

Danger from being entrusted with the interests 
of others, 80 

LETTER VII. 

Danger from coming into possession of great 

WEALTH, 90 



PART II. 

CHARACTER TO WHICH YOUNG MEN SHOULD 
ASPIRE. 

LETTER VIII. 
Integrity, . . . . lOl 

LETTER IX. 
Diligence, 117 

LETTER X. 
Economy, ..... 129 



CONTENTS. T 

LETTER XI. 

Pag*. 

Dignity, 137 

LETTER XII. 
Sympathy, 154 

LETTER XHI. 
Forgiveness of injuries. 166 

LETTER XIV. 
Filial regard, 181 

LETTER XV. 
Dependance on God, 194 



PART III. 

REWARDS THAT CROWN A VIRTUOUS COURSE. 

LETTER XVI. 
Virtue crowned with safety, ........ 207 

LETTER XVII. 
Virtue crowned with peace, 217 

LETTER XVHX 
Virtue crowned with riches, 227 



VI CONTENTS. 

LETTER XIX. 

Page 

Virtue crowned with honour, 240 

LETTER XX. 
Virtue crowned with usefulness, 252 

LETTER XXI. 
Virtue crowned with heaven. 263 



OUTLINE 



OF THE 



HISTORY OF JOSEPH. 



The first scene in the history of Joseph, as it is 
preserved in the inspired record, occurred when he 
was about seventeen years of age, while he yet 
dwelt with Jacob his father in the land of Canaan, 
and was occupied with his brethren in the capacity 
of a shepherd. As he seems to have been a boy 
of uncommon promise, and was the child of his 
father's old age, and withal had lost a mother 
whose memory was most dear to the heart of his 
surviving parent, it is not strange that Jacob should 
have regarded him with peculiar affection; nor, 
considering the weakness of human nature, was 
it strange that his affection should have betrayed 
him into an unreasonable and dangerous partiality. 



8 OUTLINE OF THE 

He manifested his preference for him by dressing 
him up in a showy and perhaps expensive coat — 
a measure certainly which was but too well fitted 
to call forth the envy of his brethren. 

About this time Joseph had two singular dreams, 
representing most strikingly his own future ascen- 
dancy over his brethren; and these dreams, no 
doubt in consequence of divine intimation, he 
communicated to them : and, as might have been 
expected, they heard him with any thing else than 
pleasure or patience. Having gone from home to 
feed their fathers flock, Jacob proposed to Joseph 
that he should go and make them a visit, and in 
due time return and report to him concerning th^ir 
prosperity. Joseph, in the spirit of prompt ouc 
dience to his father, and with no other feeling than 
that of good will toward his brethren, fell in at 
once with the suggestion ; and he set out imme- 
diately with a view to find them ; and though he 
had some little difficulty in ascertaining where 
they were, in consequence of their having changed 
their place of sojourn, yet he finally overtook 
them at Dothan. They saw and recognized him 
while he was yet at a distance ; and one would 
have supposed that the sight of a young brother 



HISTORY OF JOSEPH. 9 

coming directly from their aged father, to inquire 
concerning their health and prosperity, would 
have been most grateful to them; and that they 
would have run to meet him and welcome him by 
their embraces. But so far from that, the sight of 
him roused up in their bosoms a spirit of malignity 
and rancour: the fine coat and the offensive 
dreams gave them more trouble than ever : since 
they had got him into their power, they resolved 
to take vengeance on him in some way ; and their 
first determination was to despatch him on the 
spot. In consequence, however, of the proposal 
of Reuben, whose intention seems to have been to 
save Joseph's life, and ultimately cause him to be 
restored to his father, they determined to cast him 
into a pit in the wilderness, and forthwith ful- 
filled their purpose ; and then, in consequence of 
the intercessions of Judah, who seems to have 
revolted at the idea of leaving him to perish, they 
resolved to sell him, and actually did sell him, as 
a slave, to a company of Midianitish merchants 
who happened to be passing that way. 

The question now arose among these wicked 
brethren, in what manner they should conceal 
their guilt from their father ; and the conclusion 



10 OUTLINE OF THE 

was that they should take Joseph's coat, of which 
they had robbed him, and dip it in the blood of a 
kid, and pass it off upon Jacob as evidence that 
his son had been killed by some wild beast. This 
cruel purpose they put into execution. And it 
had the desired effect ; for the moment Jacob saw 
it, he recognized it as his son's coat, and exclaimed 
with anguish that an evil beast had devoured him, 
and no doubt he had been torn in pieces. Imme- 
diately he went into mourning for his son, and 
refused all the consolation which was proffered 
him, exclaiming in the bitterness of his soul, and 
in the sublimity of parental tenderness, " I will go 
down into the grave unto my son mourning." 

Meanwhile, the Midianites who had bought 
Joseph, sold him into Egypt, to Potiphar, the 
Captain of the king's guard. And Joseph, by his 
exemplary fidelity, so commended himself to his 
new master, that he was presently advanced to a 
station of influence and authority — was made 
overseer of his house, and was entrusted with the 
management of all his concerns. In this new 
station Joseph showed himself at once entirely at 
home ; and all things went prosperously under his 
management; and such unlimited confidence did 



HISTORY OF JOSEPH. 11 

his master place in him, that he scarcely troubled 
himself even to inquire about his concerns. 

But now comes a critical point in the history. 
While Joseph was acquitting himself in the dis- 
charge of his official duties to the entire satisfaction 
of all concerned, Potiphar's wife formed a base 
plot for his ruin ; which, though it resulted in a 
glorious triumph of his innocence, was the means 
not only of his being thrown out of his station, 
but of his being thrown into a prison. But here 
too Joseph immediately became a favourite. He 
seems to have been destined to be a man of 
authority, wherever Providence might place him ; 
for he became to the keeper of the prison what 
he had previously been to Potiphar — a sort of 
general agent in the prison — an overseer of all 
its inmates. 

About this time, two of the king's officers — 
his chief butler and chief baker, committed some 
offence by which they incurred his displeasure ; 
arid he issued a mandate for their being cast into 
prison ; and the captain of the guard put them 
specially into Joseph's custody. These two men 
had each a troublesome dream, which Joseph 
took it upon himself to interpret : the interpreta 



12 OUTLINE OP THE 

tion of the butler's dream was. that he should be 
almost immediately restored :: .5 forom 

he king's service; bu: :ha: :: n.e :ok-:'s 
was. that within about the same period, he should 
fall a victim to the king's resentment And in 
each case the interpretation turned out to be true 
to the letter; the "inner was restored to do the 
honours of :he kind's table: the baker was hung 1 
to grace the festivities :: the king's birth lay. 
Joseph, however, still remain: He 

had indeed requested the butler, who., he relieved 
his anxiety by interpreting his ireari n/cede 

with the king in his behatij when he shonld be 
restored :: favour; but he tamed tut :: be a poor 
ungrateful creature, who though: nothing of Joseph 
s, and probably tared nol who might be 
in bondage, provided only he could himself have 
his Kberty, 

Not long after this, the lung himself had two 
strange dreams. whirh he '■ inter- 

pret as nis 0071:01s had been :: interpret theirs ; 
and n 101s to the bntlei that he had once 

been placed in a similar predicament; and he 
remembers how he was relieved nun his anxiety: 
and now. for the first time not for Joseph's 



HISTORY OF JOSEPH. 



13 



sake, but for the king's sake, he mentions 
Joseph's name to Pharaoh; or rather speaks of 
him u tig Hebrew, who had given a true 

interpretation of two dreams at least, and for 
aught he knew, might do the same of two more ; 
and this intimation was sufficient to induce the 
king to send for him. Joseph, accordingly, as 
soon as he could change his raiment, came forth 
from his dungeon, and stood in the royal pre- 
sence ; and after an introduction which did great 
credit to Joseph's piety, the king related to him 
his two dreams : at the same time declaring that 
none of his magicians were able to interpret them. 
E.;: Joseph immediately gave an interpretation: 
ed the king that they pointed to seven 
yr.rs of plenty, which were to be succeeded by 
seven years of famine ; and advised him to make 
provision, during the season of abundance, for the 
time of need. Pharaoh putting full confidence 
in Joseph's interpretation, and perceiving the 
uncommon wisdom which he evinced, forthwith 
appointed him ruler over all the land of Egypt, 
and erased him to move in the splendour becoming 
the highest official distinction. 

And now Pharaoh's dream began to be fulfilled 



14 ouTLiNr or the 

in accordance with Joseph's interpretation. For 
the first seven years, the fields yielded an unpre- 
cedented abundance ; and Joseph busied hi 
in laying up corn for the publick benefit ; and the 
amount which he accumulated is said to have 
been "as the sand of the sea, :; But then came 
the seven years of famine ; and the people every 
where were crying out for bread ; and Joseph 
threw open his store houses, and dealt on 
according to their needs. 

But it was not in Egypt only, but in the sur- 
rounding countries, that the famine prevailed; 
and Jacob and his family were likely to suffer 
in common with the rest of their countrymen. 
Hence Jacob, having heard that there was corn 
in Egypt, proposed to his sons to go down thither 
and procure a supply ; and forthwith they all set 
off, with the exception of Benjamin, the youngest 
child and the darling of his father, whom he was 
unwilling to trust upon such an expedition : and 
the reason that he gave for his unwillingness — 
u lest mischief might befal him in the way," — 
would seem to convey a touching allusion to the 
fate of his beloved Joseph. Having arrived in 
Egypt, they went first to present themselves 



HISTORY OF JOSEPH. 15 

before the governour ; and on approaching him, 
" they bowed themselves with their faces to the 
earth;" and then, though they suspected it not 
— then began to be fulfilled the famous dream, 
for -which they had hated their brother, and 
finally sold him into bondage. Joseph the 
governour w r as so unlike Joseph the slave ; 
Joseph in a palace was so different from Joseph 
in a pit, that it was not strange, especially as 
they had been separated from him for years, that 
they did not recognize him ; though, as the 
change in them was much less, he immediately 
knew them to be his brethren; — yes, the very 
brethren who had deliberately cast him into a pit 
to die, and had taken him out of it only to be 
sold into perpetual servitude. Joseph's heart 
must have been full at the discovery; but still 
he commanded himself, and stood up before them 
with perfect dignity. With a view to try them 
and prove them, he charged them first with being 
spies, who had> come to make their observations 
upon the nakedness of the land ; and he assumed 
towards them a stern and forbidding manner. 
But they replied to him with great simplicity — 
u Thy servants are twelve brethren, the sons of 



16 OUTLINE OF THE 

one man in the land of Canaan, and behold the 
youngest is this day with our father, and one is not." 
w Well then/' says Joseph. (; thus shall your sin- 
cerity be tested — let one of your number go and 
bring that youngest brother down hither, while the 
rest of you remain in prison : and the failure to 
bring him shall be the proof that you are spies." 
Then Joseph put them all into prison together, and 
they remained there three days : and at the end 
of that time, he so far varied his purpose, as to 
require one of them to be bound in prison as a 
hostage, and to permit the rest to go and carry 
corn to their families : charging them again to 
bring their youngest brother back as a proof that 
they were not spies. And now conscience began 
to bring up before them the image of their poor 
brother whom they had sold as a slave : and they 
had a most sorrowful conference with each other 
on the subject, directly in the presence of Joseph, 
who. they took for granted, did not understand 
them, while yet he really did understand every 
word : and lie was even obliged to turn away from 
them to conceal his tears. But immediately he 
got command of himself again, and resumed his 



HISTORY OF JOSEPH, 17 

conversation with them, and took from them 
Simeon, and bound him before their eyes. 

Previous to their setting off on their journey 
home 3 Joseph gave directions not only that each 
man's sack should be filled with corn, but thai 
each man's money should be put into his sack ; 
and that provision should be furnished them ade 
quate to their journey. After having proceeded a 
short distance, one of them having occasion to 
open his sack, discovered that his money had been 
restored : and this became a new source of anxiety 
to them ; and while they were unable to conjecture 
the true explanation of it, their consciences were 
ready to construe it into an indication of evil. In 
this state of depression they reached home ; and 
a most sorrowful story they had to tell to their 
aged father — the gloomiest part of which was, 
that they had entered into a covenant with the 
governour of Egypt, which required that his be* 
loved Benjamin should be taken from him. Jacob's 
feelings instantly rose against this suggestion, and 
he gave vent to them in that memorable exclama- 
tion — "Me ye have bereaved of my children: 
Joseph is not, and Simeon is not, and ye will take 
Benjamin away. All these things are against me !' J 
2 



18 OUTLINE OF THE 

But though Jacob, at first, utterly refused to yield 
to the importunity of his sons to let Benjamin go, 
yet, when the corn which they had brought up 
from Egypt was exhausted, and the famine waxed 
more and more severe, he finally consented, though 
with great reluctance, to withdraw his objections ; 
and having charged them to take valuable presents 
to the governour, with a view to propitiate him, he 
commended them all to the protection and mercy 
of God ; at the same time expressing his submission 
to the divine will in this remarkable language — 
" If I am bereaved of my children, I am bereaved." 

The brethren, with Benjamin of their number, 
now went down into Egypt ; and when, on their 
arrival, Joseph saw that Benjamin was with them, 
he gave orders to the ruler of his house to bring 
them all home to dinner. But, instead of consid- 
ering this as a favour and an honour, they saw 
in it the signs of alarming evil ; they remembered 
the mysterious affair of the money being found in 
their sacks ; and they suspected that the invitation 
to dinner would turn out to be a summons to a 
state of bondage. As they met the steward on 
their approach to the house, they began immedi- 
ately to explain their own conduct, and assured 



HISTORY OF JOSEPH. 19 

him that the affair of the money was all a mystery 
to them, and that they had not only brought it all 
.. but had brought other money, with a view 
to make still further purchases : upon which the 
steward instantly put to flight all their appre- 
:nSj and brought out Simeon, with whom 
no doubt they mus: have had a most agreeable 
meeting. 

At length Joseph returned : and they met him 
with the present, and bowed in his presence to do 
him honour : and he inquired concerning the health 
of their father, and obtained from them the infor- 
mation he wished. But when he saw his brother 
Benjamin — his own mother's son. it was more 
than he could bear : his fraternal sensibilities, for 
the time, got the better of him ; and he retired 
into his chamber and remained there, till the first 
gush of feeling was over. Then he came out of 
his chamber and ordered dinner to be served ; and, 
greatly to the astonishment of his guests, he 
arranged them at the table according to their 
respective ages, and gave to Benjamin a portion 
larger by five times than to any of the rest. He 
himself sat down to a different table, as the Egyp- 
tians were not permitted to eat with the Hebrews ; 



20 OUTLINE OF THE 

but the history informs us that " they drank and 
were merry together." 

But Joseph had not yet sufficiently proved his 
brethren. He therefore commanded his steward, 
as they were about to depart, to fill the men's 
sacks with food, and to put every man's money 
into the mouth of his sack, and to put his own 
silver cup into the sack of the youngest ; and the 
command was faithfully obeyed. Soon after they 
had taken their departure, the steward, by Joseph's 
direction, proceeded in great haste after them, and 
overtook them, and charged them with having in 
their possession the cup from which the governoui 
drank, and by means of which he conducted his 
divinations. Astonished at the charge, and con- 
scious of their own innocence in the matter, they 
challenged an examination of their sacks, declaring, 
at the same time, that if it were found upon any 
one of them, he should die, and the rest should go 
into bondage. To their utter consternation, the 
cup was found in Benjamin's sack; and as soon 
as the discovery was made, they rent their clothes, 
and returned with heavy hearts to the city. And 
then they prostrated themselves before Joseph; 
and Judah, who spake in behalf of the whole 



HISTORY OF JOSEPH, 21 

company, acknowledged that God had found out 
their iniquity, and that they were all fairly com- 
mitted to a state of bondage. But Joseph said, 
tt God forbid that I should do so : but the man 
in whose hand the cup is found, he shall be my 
servant ; and as for you, get you up in peace unto 
your father." Then Judah expostulated with the 
goyernour, and went over with the story of his 
father's anxieties and sorrows — how reluctant his 
father had been to part with Benjamin, and how 
he had pledged himself that his darling child 
should return to him in safety; and finally, he 
asked it as a privilege that he might remain in 
bondage in place of his younger brother, lest his 
aged father should go down to the grave under 
the weight of his afflictions. 

By this time Joseph had sufficiently tested their 
state of feeling; and more than that — he had 
become so much dissolved by Judah's speech, that 
it was impossible for him to suppress his emotions: 
and now he clears the room of all but his brethren, 
with a view to reveal to them a most astounding 
secret. Here is the governour of Egypt standing 
before these apparently unfortunate men, with 
something upon his heart that makes him weep. 



22 OUTLINE OF THE 

What he is about to say. they cannot even con- 
jecture; but at length it comes out amidst tears 
and sobs — li I am Joseph;" and the very first 
question he asked, was one that showed that the 
son had not been lost in the governour — "Doth 
my father yet live ? " No wonder that the reve- 
lation overpowered his brethren, and that their 
lips were sealed, so that they could not answer 
him. But Joseph endeavoured instantly to quiet 
their apprehensions, by assuring them that he was 
their brother still, and by referring to the gracious 
ends which Providence had accomplished through 
their instrumentality; and then he directed them 
to go up to Canaan and bring down their father, 
and their families, and all that they had, for a 
residence in Egypt ; that he might have the privi- 
lege of ministering to their wants and nourishing 
them upon the royal bounty. Then he fell upon 
his brother Benjamin's neck and wept; and 
Benjamin wept upon his neck ; and he embraced 
them all in turn, and wept upon them ; and after 
these ample pledges of his affection, they gather- 
ed confidence to converse with him. The news 
was immediately communicated to Pharaoh, and 
he cordially seconded Joseph's wishes ; and the 



HISTORY OF JOSEPH. 23 

brethren having received valuable presents from 
Joseph, were forthwith despatched to Canaan, to 
bring down their father and their respective fami- 
lies to reside in the land of Egypt. It is worthy 
of remark that, before they set out on their 
journey, Joseph charged them that they should 
not fall out by the way — a caution which was 
very naturally suggested by the experience he had 
formerly had of their tempers, and which was a 
delicate way of reminding them of the past, and 
suggesting matter for reflection and ground for 
repentance. 

Agreeably to Joseph's directions, his brethren 
proceeded immediately to Canaan ; and it is 
scarcely necessary to say that they approached 
their father with far better news and far lighter 
hearts than when they returned from their former 
journey. Instead of bringing him the intelligence 
that Joseph is dead, or that Benjamin must be 
taken from him, as they had done on former 
occasions, they come with the grateful tidings 
that Joseph is alive, and is governour of the 
whole land of Egypt. At first the good old man 
fainted ; for the news seemed to him too good to 
be true. But when he actually saw the waggons 



24 OTJTLINE OF THE 

which Joseph had sent to convey him and his 
family to their new home, " his spirit revived, and 
he said — It is enough; Joseph my son is yet 
alive ; I will go and see him before I die." 

In pursuance of this resolution, as soon as the 
necessary arrangements could be made for the 
journey, the whole family set off for Egypt. 
And when the news of their approach reached 
Joseph, he made ready his chariot, and went out 
as far as Goshen to meet his father. Conceive 
now, if you can, what a meeting that must have 
been! Joseph fell upon his father's neck — the 
father who had loved him so much, and from 
whom he had been separated so long — and 
kissed him and wept ; while the father gave 
utterance to his full heart in such language as 
this — " Now, let me die, since I have seen thy 
face, because thou art yet alive." " The coat 
which I gave thee in thy childhood, was brought 
to me by thy brethren stained with blood, as an 
evidence that thou wast dead ; and my heart has 
a thousand times bled, as my imagination has 
lingered upon what I supposed might have been 
thy dying scene; and yet, after all, here thou 
art, my son, not only alive, but in affluence and 



HISTORY OF JOSEPH. 25 

honour. God's goodness overwhelms me. It is 
enough — I am ready to die, O Lord, for I have 
seen thy salvation." 

Joseph immediately informed Pharaoh of the 
arrival of his family, and then he took five of his 
brethren, and presented them to him ; and Pharaoh 
had an interview with them ; after which, he 
brought up his aged and venerable father, and 
introduced him to the king ; and Jacob appeared 
on the occasion with all that simplicity, dignity 
and piety, which became a prophet and a patriarch : 
and on retiring from the presence of Pharaoh, he 
gave him his blessing. Joseph now, w T ith the 
consent and advice of the king, appointed his 
father and brethren their residence in the most 
desirable part of the land of Egypt, and there nour- 
ished them with fraternal and filial tenderness, 
while he proceeded in the execution of his public 
trust with his accustomed fidelity. 

After Jacob had been for some time in his new 
residence, sustained and cheered by the bounty of 
his son, intelligence was brought to Joseph that 
his father was sick ; and straightway he hastened 
to his bedside, that he might minister to his last 
wants and receive his parting blessing. After he 



26 OUTLINE OF THE 

was dead he manifested the deepest grief at his 
departure, and, with a gush of sorrow and affection, 
even embraced his corpse. When the usual period 
of public mourning had been fulfilled, agreeably 
to a promise which he had made to his father 
before his death, he caused his remains to be carried 
back to Canaan that his final resting place might 
be with his fathers. 

Shortly after the death of Jacob, Joseph's 
brethren began to fear, that, since their father 
was out of the way, it might occur to Joseph to 
take revenge on them for the cruel treatment 
which he had received at their hands in former 
years ; and so apprehensive were they of this, that 
they sent a messenger to him humbly imploring 
his forgiveness and continued protection. Joseph 
was deeply affected by the communication, and 
assured them that they should receive nothing from 
him but expressions of fraternal kindness. And 
this promise he ever most sacredly fulfilled. At 
length the time of his departure drew near ; and hav- 
ing taken an oath of his brethren, that they would 
carry his bones also up into the land of Egypt, he 
died at the age of a hundred and ten years, and his 
body was embalmed after the manner of the Egyp- 
tians. 



LETTERS 

TO 



YOUNG MEN 



PART I. 

SOURCES OF DANGER TO YOUNG ME3* 
LETTER I. 

SANGER FROM EXCESSIVE PARENTAL INDULGENCE, 

The growing conviction which I have had for 
years of the importance of those interests which are 
soon to be devolved upon the young men of the 
present generation , has, at different times, brought 
me almost to the determination of addressing to 
them a short series of letters designed to impress 
•them with a sense of their obligations, and to aid 
in the general formation of their character. I 
have, however, been deterred from executing, or 
even forming, a definite purpose on this subject, 
by the consideration that many wise and excellent 



30 DANGER FROM EXCESSIVE 

men have already written books of counsel to the 
young, to which they can readily gain access ; 
and that any attempt which I might make would 
result in nothing better than a repetition of things 
which had often been more attractively and more 
impressively said before. It occurred to me, 
however, lately, as I was reading the touching 
and beautiful story of Joseph, that there is much 
in it that deserves the most attentive considera- 
tion, especially of every young man ; and in this 
thought originated the purpose, which I have 
now set myself to execute — of endeavouring to 
render this scripture narrative subservient to the 
best interests of the young men of the present 
day. Still, my young friends, I have no expecta- 
tion of offering any thing to your consideration 
that is substantially new : the utmost that I can 
hope is, that I may give increasing effect to the 
counsels which I shall suggest, by incorporating 
them with a story, which, in respect to the interest 
of its incidents and the beauty of its descriptions, 
is universally acknowledged to be unrivalled even 
in the sacred scriptures. I have given you an 
outline of the history, that you may the more 
readily see how the various points which I shall 



PARENTAL INDULGENCE. 31 

have occasion to bring out, connect themselves 
with it ; though I hardly need say that you will 
do yourselves great injustice, if, instead of being 
satisfied with any outline, you do not study, till 
you have rendered perfectly familiar to you, the 
original record. 

You can hardly read this narrative without 
being struck with the fact, that Joseph was often 
placed in circumstances of great peril — circum- 
stances strikingly analogous to those in which 
young men are not unfrequently placed at the 
present day. Indeed, it is in such a condition as 
this that the history first presents him to us — in 
jeopardy from the indiscreet favouritism of his 
father. It was certainly an unworthy partiality^ 
which Jacob discovered towards him, in the affair 
of the coat : it was fitted to excite not only the 
envy of his brethren but his own pride ; and if it 
did not produce the latter effect as well as the 
former, we must attribute it to Joseph's well 
balanced character, in connection perhaps with a 
special divine interposition in his behalf. There 
was, after all, some apology for Jacob in th.ii 
matter ; for not only was he far advanced in life, 
but Joseph was evidently distinguished above his 



32 DANGER FROM EXCESSIVE 

other children, by his intellectual and mora. 
endowments ; and withal he was the son of his 
beloved Rachel, who had not been long dead, 
and whose memory he still cherished with the 
strongest affection . 

Many parents beside Jacob are chargeable 
with indiscreet preferences in the treatment of 
their children. I will not dw r ell here upon the 
evil effect that results to those w r ho, like the sons 
of the patriarch, regard themselves as wronged 
out of the place that really belongs to them in 
the affection of their parents ; but I will advert 
only to the evil that is likely to accrue to those 
who are the subjects of an unreasonable partiality 
• — or rather who are the subjects of excessive 
indulgence, whether there be any preference 
manifested in respect to them or not. I say, 
then, every young man w r ho, either from having 
no parents, or from having indiscreet parents, is 
left in the enjoyment of an undue degree of 
liberty, is in danger — imminent danger, accord- 
ing to the nature or the strength of his ruling 
passion. 

There is danger that a young man, who is 
suffered to grow up in a great measure uncon- 



PARIETAL INDULGENCE. 33 

trolled, will form a habit of idleness. We do not 
find that children, if left to themselves, choose 
labour: and where they form the habit, it is 
usually the result of parental instruction, and 
counsel, and perhaps authority, rather than of 
their own taste or inclination. You may look all 
the world over, and you will find, with few excep- 
tions, that young persons who are allowed to 
do just as they please, show themselves 
to do very little — at least little to any good 
purpose : and the consequence is. that, at no 
.nod, they have a confirmed habit of 
idleness which renders them little better than cum- 
berers of the ground. 

They are exposed also, from the same cause, to 
neglect the culture of their minds, and thus to 
appear on the stage of life with a claim to 
respectability, and with means of usefulness, far 
less 3 than it might have been their privilege to 
enjoy. There are indeed some minds constituted 
with such decided intellectual tendencies, that 
they require direction merely, without any exter- 
nal exciting influence ; but the great mass of 
youthful minds will in a measure stagnate — 
certainly will not realize a legitimate develop- 
3 



34 DANGER FHOM EXCESSIVE 

ment, — unless they are quickened as well as 
guided by an influence from without. You may 
see this point strikingly illustrated in almost any 
literary institution — the patient, the diligent, the 
successful students, you will generally find to be 
those who have been accustomed to the influence 
of suitable restraint ; while the indolent and dis- 
graced, who hold their places by mere sufferance, 
are as generally from the ranks of those who are 
left from the beginning with little that approaches 
to parental control. I do not say that a young 
man may not evince fine powers, and yet be 
suffered even from childhood, to take his own 
way ; and in some instances, owing to a peculiarly 
happy mental constitution, or to a specially favour- 
ing Providence, that way may prove the right one, 
and he may be early matured for extensive useful- 
ness ; but I do say that, in all ordinary cases of 
extreme parental indulgence, even the best powers 
remain to a great extent uncultivated ; and a dis- 
graceful ignorance is always found to hang upon 
the heels of an indolent inaction. 

Young men who are excessively indulged, are 
in danger, still farther, of contracting a habit of 
extravagance in their pecuniary expenditures. 



PARENTAL INDULGENCE. 35 

Especially is this true, where the parent possesses, 
or is supposed to possess, a large estate ; for let a 
young man once get into his head the idea that he 
has money enough at his command, and that, 
however others may find it necessary to labour for 
a living, he has nothing to do but sit still and enjoy 
an estate made ready to his hands — and you will 
find that, in the act of taking up this idea, he 
becomes a prodigal, if not a profligate. It often 
happens that this painful result is realized, where 
there is only a show of wealth without the sub- 
stance ; and the poor indulged young man who 
had formed a habit of extravagance on the pre- 
sumption that his father was as rich as he seemed 
to be, is at length mortified and shocked to find 
that what he regarded substantial wealth was mere 
pretension, and that his extravagant tastes are in 
miserable keeping with what turns out to be his 
actual condition. When this unwelcome discovery 
is made, the danger is, that, instead of leading to 
better habits, it will lead to other habits of evil, 
with a view to keep up those which have been 
already formed. 

I will only add that there is danger, from this 
source, that young men will grow up to be the 



36 DANGER FROM EXCESSIVE 

victims of unrestrained passion. The passions 
constitute a most important part of our moral 
nature ; and if they are not kept under in the 
beginning, they will inevitably gain the ascend- 
ancy, and, at no distant period, become the tyrants 
of the soul. Take, for instance, the passion of 
anger — or, if you please, what is commonly called 
spirit in a child — let it be subject to suitable 
restraint and developed under the influence of 
right instruction, and there will be nothing to be 
feared from it — it may prove an element of dig- 
nity and strength and usefulness in the future 
character. But let it be unrestrained in its exer- 
cise — let it blaze forth in foolish and violent acts 
without meeting a reproof — and you need not 
wonder if it shall mature itself by and by into 
savage ferocity or black malignity — need not 
wonder if, even before the age of manhood has 
arrived, some desperate act shall draw after it a 
fearful punishment, to be endured in a dungeon or 
on a gallows. 

It may occur to you that the subject of this 
letter might more fittingly be urged on the consid- 
eration of parents and guardians of youth, than 
of young men themselves ; inasmuch as the duty 



PARENTAL INDULGENCE. 37 

to which it points devolves primarily upon them. 
But let me say, if your parents err ever so much 
in this matter, you are still moral agents, and you 
have no right to be misled by them. What 
though in the weakness sometimes incident to 
parental affection, they may leave you to choose 
your own course, and may seem to take for 
granted that whatever you do, is, from the very 
circumstance of your doing it, right; — you are to 
regard this as a snare which they have uninten- 
tionally laid for you, and to beware that you fall 
not into it. If you are permitted to choose 
between idleness and activity, be active. If 
between the culture and the neglect of your 
intellect, be studious. If between a habit of 
economy and of extravagance, be economical. 
If between the subjection of your passions to 
your reason, and the domination of your passions 
over your reason, let reason assert and maintain 
the control to which she is entitled. Remember 
that you are to form a character for yourselves; 
and that you have no right to suffer even a mis- 
guided parental affection to stand between you 
and a virtuous, honourable, useful life. 



38 DANGER FROM 



LETTER II. 

DANGER FROM INJURIOUS TREATMENT. 

There is no topic with which the name of Joseph 
more immediately connects itself than this. You 
have seen in the brief sketch of his life that 
has been presented, that, w T hile he was yet a 
harmless and lovely boy, he became the object 
of envy and persecution from his brethren; — 
that they at first formed a deliberate purpose to 
murder him, which gave way only to another 
scarcely less horrible — that of selling him as a 
slave; — that they actually did sell him into an 
ignoble bondage, with the full expectation that he 
would never meet his father again, and that the 
first relief which he would find from his degraded 
condition would be in the grave : — and all this, 
it is to be remembered, for no other offence on his 
part, than that of having had what his brethren 
considered a bad dream, and of being the object 
of his father's special regard. And notwith- 



INJURIOUS TREATMENT. 39 

standing these were the most memorable acts of 
unkind ness toward him of which we have any 
knowledge, yet we find, as we advance in his 
history, that his brethren were not alone in their 
evil treatment of him — the wife of Potiphar, 
because she found that she could not ruin him in 
one way, resolved that she would ruin him in 
another, and by a base and vindictive fabrication 
caused him, for a time, to be shut up in prison ; 
and the butler, whose anxiety he relieved by 
interpreting his dream, and who promised to use 
his influence for his being set at liberty, ungrate- 
fully forgot his promise, and, but for a casual 
occurrence in which the king was immediately 
interested, might never afterwards have mentioned 
Joseph's name. If, taking the whole of his life 
together, Joseph had more friends, and received 
more testimonies of favour, both publick and pri- 
vate, than fall to the lot of most men, it cannot 
be denied, on the other hand, that very few have 
been the objects of such marked injustice and 
persecution, especially from their own brethren. 

It would be strange, my young friends, even 
though you may have lived but a few years in the 
world, if your brief history does not already sup- 



40 DANGER FROM 

ply some cases in which you regard yourselves as 
having been the subjects of injurious treatment ; 
and it would be yet more strange, if this should 
be true of you when you reach your maturity. I 
am well aware that young men are generally too 
prone to fancy injuries where none are intended ; 
and not unfrequently a merely imaginary insult 
awakens a spirit of complaint or retaliation, which, 
in turn, is visited with some substantial injury ; 
and however unjustifiable the infliction of the 
injury may be, the person who has needlessly and 
foolishly provoked it, must at least come in for a 
share of the guilt. But, leaving out of view 
these cases, there are many in which young men 
are the subjects of injurious treatment, where 
their own previous conduct has been altogether 
exemplary. Sometimes their just rights are un- 
reasonably infringed by the avarice of their 
employers ; and an amount of service is required 
of them which it is altogether unreasonable — 
perhaps impossible, that they should render. 
Sometimes their necessary wants are overlooked, 
and the pledge that has been made to their parents 
to provide for them suitable food and clothing, is 
wantonly violated. And sometimes too their feel- 



INJURIOUS TREATMENT. 41 

ings are continually fretted or even lacerated by a 
spirit of fault finding — when they have done their 
best, they are still met with sullen looks, if not 
with reproachful and angry words. And it is not 
merely from those in whose service they are, that 
young men are liable to receive offensive treatment, 
but from each other also ; and perhaps the danger 
is greater in the latter case than in the former. 
For the fact that they are nearly of the same age, 
brings them into more immediate contact ; they 
feel a greater freedom both in respect to their 
words and actions ; and that which begins in 
sport often terminates in an affray. In cases of 
this kind, it usually happens indeed that the blame 
is shared by both parties ; and yet it is by no 
means uncommon for a young man to become the 
object of persecution from his fellows, without 
having given even a semblance of a cause for 
their ill will — nay, this has often occurred for no 
other reason, than that he would not be a party to 
their evil plans, or a screen to their evil deeds. 

It is proper to remark here, that there are many 
jvils to which you may be exposed from the 
injurious treatment that is exercised towards you, 
in respect to which you need give yourselves no 



42 DANGER FROM 

serious trouble. You may be cheated out of your 
property, and thus your means of worldly comfort 
may be greatly abridged. Your innocent and 
perhaps praiseworthy actions may be grossly mis- 
represented, and, in consequence of this, your 
good name may, for some time, seem actually to 
lie under a cloud. You may be prevented, by 
sheer malignity, from occupying some post of 
influence and usefulness, for which you have the 
most ample qualifications, and upon which your 
eye and your heart have long been fixed. Each 
of these you may regard as a serious evil — and 
so indeed it may be; and yet, after all, it is 
nothing from which, in the issue, you have any 
thing to fear. If God, in his providence, suffers 
these things to befall you, He has wise reasons 
for doing so ; and if it is not your own fault, you 
will, ere long, find occasion to rejoice in them. 
He has constituted things in such a manner, that, 
in all ordinary cases, the oppressor and the unjust 
man on the one hand, and the sufferer from 
oppression and injustice on the other, each finds 
his proper place, — and that too, at no distant 
period. I could point you to many cases stri- 
kingly illustrative of this feature in the divine 



INJURIOUS TREATMENT. 43 

economy ; but I will only say, if you are your- 
selves the sufferers, fear not. Wait a little, and 
in all probability the dishonour done to your 
character will be retrieved ; the darkness which 
had seemed to settle around you will pass away. 
But even if it should be otherwise — if the injustice 
of your fellow creatures should prevail against you 
to your dying- day, — if you have suffered with a 
right spirit, you will find your remedy and your 
recompense then, in the joys of a better and nobler 
existence. 

But there is another class of evils to which you 
are exposed from the injurious treatment you may 
receive, which are far more formidable, and against 
which you have reason to guard with most vigilant 
concern — evils, I mean, as connected with your 
own temper and conduct. Suffer me to mention a 
few of them. 

Your first danger on the reception of an injury, 
especially if it be an unlooked for injury, is, that 
you will become unduly excited, and in this state 
of feeling say or do things, which *will at least 
require to be repented of, and possibly subject you 
to the most serious inconvenience. All this may 
be distinct from any definite and deliberate pur- 



44 BANGER FROM 

pose of evil — it may be a mere gust of passio»> 
which may subside in a moment, though possibly 
the moment through which it lasts, may be remem- 
bered with bitter regret, so long as any thing earthly 
is the subject of recollection. 

But the danger is, that the consequences of 
your having been injuriously treated will not stop 
here — that, instead of dismissing the subject from 
your mind, to be recalled only as an occasion for 
self condemnation and repentance, you will brood 
over it, magnifying its features of provocation and 
insult, till the dark spirit of revenge gets thorough 
possession of your bosom. Be it so, that, from 
fear or from some selfish considerations, you are 
prevented from even forming a purpose to injure 
the person who has injured you — but still you 
wish you could do it with impunity ; and you are 
hoping that others who are more courageous than 
you, may do it ; or that God may do it by sending 
some great providential calamity ; and you stand 
ready to begin your exultation, the moment your 
enemy beging to writhe. You are like one who 
has swallowed a living viper, and feels its deadly 
corrosions every moment. By a habit of self- 
command, you may so far control yourself, that 



INJUPdOUS TREATMENT. 45 

even those who scrutinize your conduct the most 
closely, shall not know or suspect what is passing 
within you; but nothing can make you happy — 
nothing can save you from being wretched, till 
this enemy of your peace is effectually dislodged. 

Remember, further, that the spirit of revenge 
never occupies the bosom alone. While it creates 
an atmosphere in which all gentle and kind and 
virtuous dispositions die, it quickens into life 
every latent seed of evil, and even attracts to 
itself fierce auxiliaries from the abodes of darkness. 
I do not say that a revengeful man may not play 
the hypocrite, and pass for something that he is 
not ; but I do say that, if you could penetrate the 
interior of his heart, you would find it only a 
region of darkness and storms — of thorns and 
briers, that is nigh unto cursing. 

But it is not always, nor even generally, that 
the revengeful spirit is thus kept in check: in 
most instances where it is thoroughly aroused, 
it never rests until it is satiated. Perhaps it 
breaks out at once in some desperate act, which 
meets its punishment in years spent in the peni- 
tentiary. Perhaps it seems, for the time, to take 
little note of the injury; and months or even 



46 

years may pass away, and yet no hostile demon- 
stration be made ; but this whole period may prove 
to have been occupied with the preparation for 
some fiendlike assault ; and the assault may prove 
the more terrible, from the fact of its having been 
so long delayed. What a fearful bearing on this 
subject has the history of duelling! Many a 
young man, under some slight sense of injury, 
has sent a challenge, which has resulted in his 
going into the field, to come back a murderer, 
or to be brought back a corpse. Besides these 
greater evils which may follow in the train of 
injurious treatment, I may mention that there is 
danger also, that it will beget a morbid distrust 
and dislike of mankind in general. Let a young 
man, with the little experience which he has had 
of the world, meet with some signal instance or 
instances of injustice or cruelty from those from 
whom he had a right to expect better things — 
especially as in the case of Joseph, from near 
relatives, and it will be strange, if it does not 
lead him to judge others with undue severity, and 
even sometimes to withhold confidence without 
any adequate reason. Thus his disposition be- 
comes poisoned, his habits morose, and his social 



47 

relations a channel of little good either to his 
friends or the world. 

If you would avoid the evils at which I have 
hinted in this letter, make up your mind that you 
cannot long escape injurious treatment of some 
kind, and resolve that you will be governed, in 
view of it, only by those rules which Christianity 
prescribes. 



LETTER III. 



DANGER FROM LIVING AWAY FROM HOME. 

It was the lot of Joseph, while he was yet a 
mere stripling, to be removed from beneath the 
watchful eye of his father, and to be thrown, at 
that most critical period of life, altogether among 
strangers. Little indeed did his father imagine, 
when he sent him out to make a friendly visit to 
his brethren, with a view to bring him tidings 
concerning their welfare, that such was to be his 



48 DANGER FROM LIVING 

lot : he expected that, in a short time, he would 
be with him again, and that he should have the 
privilege, for years, of exerting a direct influence 
in the formation of his character. But a result 
very different from this had Providence ordained. 
The separation which both Joseph and his father 
supposed would be very brief, proved to be a 
separation for years ; and those too, years, in 
respect to Joseph, in which a well-directed paren- 
tal influence is of the greatest moment, 

Notwithstanding the circumstances in which 
the early separation of Joseph from his father 
took place, may have never had their parallel in 
human experience, the separation itself was only 
an occurrence which is incidental to a large 
portion of our young men, several years before 
they leave their minority. Some are placed, at a 
very early period, at boarding schools, and, a few 
years later, are sent to college. Others go from 
home to learn a mechanical trade ; others, to 
acquire a mercantile education ; and others still, 
to travel — perhaps with, perhaps without, a 
companion, in foreign countries. Though there 
are doubtless many cases in which young men 
leave the parental roof prematurely, or for pur- 



AWAY FROM HOME. 49 

poses which cannot be justified, yet it seems to De 
the ordinance of Providence that, in most cases, 
after a few of their earlier years are past, they 
should be thrown, more or less, away from home, 
with reference to their ulterior and permanent 
arrangements. A large proportion of those who 
have passed the age of sixteen or seventeen, are in 
circumstances which make them only occasional 
visitors, rather than stated residents, at the 
domestic mansion. Without complaining of this 
arrangement of providence — for a providential 
arrangement it certainly is — I maintain that 
there are great dangers incident to it; — dangers 
against which every young man should be on his 
guard, as he values his own best interests, and 
the hopes and the happiness of those who are most 
dear to him. 

As I suppose myself, for the present, to be 
addressing young men who either are, or are 
soon to be, in the circumstances to which I have 
referred, let me say, in the first place, that your 
danger results, in no small degree, from the fact 
that, while the temptations which you have to 
encounter, may generally be supposed to be 
increased by a residence away from home, there 
4 



50 DANGER FROM LIVING 

is a proportional diminution of those external 
influences which are fitted to enable you to meet 
them successfully. 

No situation indeed can be found, in which a 
young man will be entirely exempt from tempta- 
tion ; and yet perhaps there is none in which 
fewer temptations will meet him, than that which 
he holds as the natural member of an enlightened 
and virtuous family. The mere fact of a change 
from this — of any change which he may make — 
will be likely to have in it the elements of danger ; 
for it will almost of course give 1 some new direc- 
tion, or some new impulse, to his faculties and 
feelings ; and with the evil tendencies that belong 
to human nature, there is always a chance at least 
that it will be less for good than for evil. In 
addition to this, it is more than probable that the 
new circumstances into which he is thrown by the 
change, will have far more in them that will 
invite to evil than he has been accustomed to find 
m his previous situation. Perhaps from the quiet 
)f a country home he goes to reside in the city, 
where temptations of some kind or other meet 
him on every side : here especially the path to 
vice — the path to ruin, is bestrewed with flowers ; 



AWAY FROM HOME. 51 

and the danger is that he will have started in it, 
and have advanced too far to be withdrawn, 
while yet he has scarcely a conception of the 
fatal direction in which he is travelling. No 
matter what his occupation may be — whether it 
be that of a scholar, or a merchant's clerk, or an 
apprentice to a mechanic, it w T ill have its peculiar 
temptations — temptations differing, in some re- 
spects, from those to which he has been previously 
accustomed. 

Now view the subject in another aspect, and 
see how the danger is heightened from the 
diminution of those influences which are fitted to 
neutralize the power of temptation. There is 
nothing like a healthful domestic influence to 
guard a young man from the snares that beset 
him ; or, if he has begun to meditate evil, 
nothing like this to destroy the incipient purpose. 
Suppose he has yielded to temptation in a single 
instance — has violated the convictions of his 
conscience and the often expressed wishes of his 
parents, by some evil deed which is known only 
to himself, and perhaps one or two of his asso- 
ciates; — do you imagine that he will be able 
to meet the eye of his parents, as if he were 



52 BANGER FROM LIVING 

conscious of having clean hands and a pure heart ? 
Rely on it, though they, in their ignorance, may 
administer no reproof, yet his own conscience 
will speak in their behalf, and convict him of 
monstrous filial ingratitude ; and there is some 
reason to hope that the result will be a resolute 
determination to be found no more in the path of 
the tempter. But in all ordinary cases, it is to 
be presumed that a suitable parental influence 
w 7 ill prevent, in a great measure, the evil to which 
I have here referred; or, if vicious tendencies 
begin to develop themselves, that parental vigi- 
lance will be quick to discover them, and parental 
fidelity prompt and earnest to reprove and correct 
them. And besides the influence of parents, there 
is often the influence of other members of the 
family, particularly of sisters, that is fitted to 
check his wayward propensities, and save him 
from rushing into the haunts of vice ; for a sister's 
voice will often be heard and heeded, where any 
other voice, except that of a mother, may plead 
xn vain. But if, as we are obliged to admit, even 
ft] these most propitious circumstances, there are 
many young men who not only betray wayward 
tendencies, but wander irrecoverably, how much 



AWAY FROM HOME. 53 

greater the danger, where these favouring- influ- 
ences do not exist; — where the individuals are, 
in a great measure, beyond the reach of parental 
watchfulness and counsel and restraint: — where 
they may yield to their perverse inclinations, and 
not be obliged, the next hour, to meet the eye 
which, of all eyes on earth, is most dreadful to a 
guilty child ! Perhaps, too, they were accus- 
tomed at home to circle the altar of prayer, 
morning and evening, whereas now they may be 
cut off from this privilege also : and who does 
not see that the very habit of mingling in such 
an exercise, even where there may be much 
less of the spirit of devotion than could be 
desired, is adapted to fortify the mind in some 
measure against temptation : and that a sudden 
transition to a prayerless domestic circle, must 
almost inevitably weaken the barriers which a 
religious education may have imposed against 
unreasonable and sinful indulgences. 

There is, also, if I mistake not an influence 
favourable to virtuous dispositions in that inter- 
change of social and kindly and affectionate 
feeling, that is peculiar to one's own family circle, 
This, of course, takes for granted, that the family 



54 DANGER FROM LIVING 

is. in some degree, what it should be — a nursery 
of all those good affections which enter into the 
true idea of home; — for it is quite possible that 
a child may have such a home, that the greatest 
blessing that can come to him, may be that of a 
permanent separation from it. But, where the 
members of a family cultivate toward each other 
a truly benevolent spirit, and cherish a warm 
interest in each other's happiness, and a tender 
sympathy in each other's sorrows, it is certainly a 
privilege to be one of them — -not merely on 
account of the rational and elevated enjoyment of 
which each becomes a sharer, but especially on 
account of the influence which is hereby exerted 
in communicating a general refinement and eleva- 
tion to the character. But, let a young man be 
taken out of such a domestic circle, and carried 
into one to which he is in no way allied, and in 
which perhaps there is no interest felt in him apart 
from that which is felt in the payment for his 
board, and you see at once there is danger that his 
generous affections will soon begin to stagnate, 
and that a selfish, not to say an unsocial, spirit will 
gradually creep over him. 

Moreover, a young man in the circumstances 



AWAY FROM HOME, 55 

which I am supposing, is in danger of contracting 
a false sense of independence. Hitherto he has 
always been within the reach of his mother's 
eye. or his father's hand ; and perhaps he has 
never even begun to learn how to resist parental 
counsels, or break away from parental restraints ; 
and possibly it may have never occurred to him 
that he was capable of doing either. But the 
change in his condition has revealed to him his 
ike. He finds himself with new ideas of 
liberty ; and with the change in his ideas, there 
quickly comes a corresponding change in his 
conduct. He demonstrates to himself his inde- 
pendence, by treating the good principles with 
which his mind had been stored, as childish and 
unworthy prejudices. The feeling which has 
got possession of him is both unsuitable and 
unlovely: and its practical development can be 
nothing but unmixed evil. Many a parent whose 
child has returned to him after a temporary 
separation, has been shocked and distressed at 
observing that in his manner which has indicated 
this painful change ; and he has been afraid to 
inquire concerning the last chapter in his history. 



56 DANGER FROM, ETC. 

lest it should be a record of evil doings that would 
make his heart bleed. 

In the course of my observation, numerous 
cases have occurred, which furnish a sad illus- 
tration of the danger which it has been the design 
of this letter to set before you. One in particular 
occurs to me at this moment, of which I will give 
you the outline, though it is only one of a class, 
to which it would not be easy to assign a limit 
I knew a lad who entered one of our colleges, a 
few years since, at the age of fourteen, who, up 
to that period, had always been under the imme- 
diate care of his mother — a mother, eminent both 
for her intelligence and piety. He possessed 
natural attractions to which few young men, 
whom I have ever known, could lay claim. His 
form was perfect symmetry ; his countenance was 
brightness mingled with loveliness ; his voice was 
melody ; and his manners the very perfection of 
grace and beautiful simplicity. He was a fine 
scholar — equally at home in every branch to 
which his attention was directed. And more than 
that — he had a high sense of moral rectitude, 
and was understood to be very exact in his habits 
of devotion. But he was removed from parental 



57 

influence, and the shock was greater than he could 
bear. Notwithstanding vigorous efforts were made 
to save him, nothing could arrest him in the down- 
ward way. From being an example of industry, 
he soon settled into a drone ; his habit of respect- 
ful modesty gave way to a revolting impudence — 
his habit of sobriety to intemperance — his habit 
of devotion to profaneness ; and within a few 
short months, he was transformed into a thorough 
profligate. He was dismissed from college, as 
one whose pestiferous influence could no longer 
be tolerated ; he passed a few years as a vagabond, 
and then died a drunkard's death. While he lived 
at home, he was an example of all that was virtu- 
ous and lovely ; but when he went from home, he 
yielded to temptation and was ruined. 

My young friends, whom Providence has sepa- 
rated from the direct influences of a Christian 
home, let such instances as this be to you as a 
volume of warning. May God enable you so to 
realize your danger, and so to act in view of it, 
that your history may hereafter be referred to, as 
illustrating the triumph and the rewards of virtue 
in trying circumstances. 



58 DANGER FROM LIVING IN A 



LETTER IV. 

DANGER FROM LIVING IN A CORRUPT STATE O* 
SOCIETY. 

In the preceding letter, your attention was 
directed to the peculiar temptations incident to 
the condition of Joseph, as living away from 
home, and beyond the immediate range of parental 
influence. But this was not all. It is possible 
that a youth may leave one good home for another ; 
and however much he may lose in being beyond 
the reach of a parent's voice that used to counsel 
and instruct him, and lead him to the throne of 
the heavenly grace, that loss may, in a measure at 
least, be made up by the religious privileges 
incident to his new condition. Very different, 
however, was the case of Joseph. By the same 
course of events that separated him from the 
home of his childhood, he was thrown among 
strangers, who, at first, had no other interest in 
him than they had in any common slave ; and, 



CORRUPT STATE OF SOCIETY. 59 

more than that, they were idolaters — they were 
ignorant of the God which Joseph had been 
taught to worship, and offered their blind and 
senseless homage to a stupid animal, And we 
may judge something of what the standard of 
morals was, by what we know of the morality of 
Pagan nations at the present day. The multitude 
were false, sensual, cruel ; and the darkness, which 
subsequently constituted one of the Egyptian 
plagues, was but a feeble representation of that 
gross moral darkness in which the land was now 
enveloped. Think of a youth, of the age of 
Joseph, being thrown into circumstances like 
these, without a single friend to point him to the 
right, or to admonish him of the wrong ; and say 
whether you can conceive of a situation that sup- 
plies a severer ordeal to youthful virtue. 

And yet, this condition in its substantial features, 
is the condition of many a young man of the 
present day — some of you no doubt into whose 
hands these pages may fall, will recognize it as 
your own. In the best state of society, there is 
wickedness enough to constitute just ground foi 
watchfulness against corrupting influences ; buJ 
there are places that are signalized by the preva 



60 DANGER FROM LIVING IN A 

lence of vice — places in Christian countries — 
even in our own country — in which virtue can 
scarcely gain a lodgment, and scenes of base 
intrigue or reckless violence make part of the 
history of almost every day. As a general rule, 
I would say that, in the selection of a permanent 
residence, you should pay much respect to the 
consideration whether the place be characterized 
by a regard to morality and religion ; for you may 
rest assured that any pecuniary advantages which 
it may afford, will be but an ill compensation for 
the evil of being constantly subjected to a corrupt- 
ing influence. But there are cases in which 
young men have been bom in these unpropitious 
circumstances, and it is almost a matter of course 
that they continue in them, at least during their 
earlier years. And then again, there are various 
events of providence which may occur to remove 
them from a more to a less favoured region, to say 
nothing of the fact that they may be led to make 
such a change from conscientious considerations — 
from a desire to place themselves in a situation 
where they may labour to the best advantage in 
the work of reformation. Where this latter motive 
operates, it may be regarded as furnishing, of itself, 



CORRUPT STATE OF SOCIETY. 61 

some security against the influence of temptation ; 
and yet so much of weakness is there pertaining 
even to human virtue, that no individual — espe- 
cially no young man — who ventures into the 
circumstances to which I am referring, can be so 
sure that he shall stand, hut that he has good 
reason to take heed lest he fall. 

That you may be duly impressed with the 
danger that pertains to this condition, consider, in 
the first place, that it supposes the absence of those 
encouragements and restraints which belong to a 
different state of society, and in which virtue finds 
her chief support. Perhaps the sabbath, instead 
of being regarded with the reverence which it 
deserves, is prostituted to worldly and sinful 
purposes — to purposes of gain, or amusement, or 
sensuality. Perhaps the institutions of Christianity 
do not exist at all, or exist only in name — if there 
is preaching, it may be B another gospel " that is 
preached, upon which God's blessing cannot be 
expected to rest. And public opinion, which, 
when properly directed, is mighty for good, may 
be ill directed, and therefore, instead of being a 
barrier against evil may be a powerful auxiliary 
to it. If you are already established in the ways 



62 DANGER FROM LIVING IN A 

of truth and virtue, how much are you indebted 
to the benign influences of Christian institutions ; 
or if you have been preserved from open vice, 
and have been enabled to maintain a fair moral 
character, are you sure that you would have 
attained even this, independently of the thousand 
nameless influences which a pure Christianity has 
brought to bear upon you? Suppose, in either 
case, all these influences had been withdrawn — 
suppose the sabbath, and the preaching of the 
gospel, and a correct public sentiment, had done 
nothing for you, ki the way of restraining, or 
directing, or encouraging — who can say but that 
you, who are now walking in the comforts of the 
Holy Ghost, might have been open apostates ; and 
you who are contributing to the strength and 
happiness of society by your generally discreet 
and exemplary deportment, might have been mise- 
rable profligates or scoffing infidels % 

But there are evil influences of a more positive 
kind, connected with the state of society which I 
am supposing. Particularly, there is the influence 
of corrupt example, which is alike insidious and 
deadly in its operation j and which, from the few 
checks that the existing state of things supplies, 



CORRUPT STATE OF SOCIETY. 63 

is likely to become an all pervading element. A 
little reflection will discover to you the process 
by which it operates. First, the mind becomes 
familiarized to vice ; and such are the evil ten- 
dencies of our nature, that familiarity rather 
inspires attachment, than awakens disgust. The 
moral perceptions and sensibilities gradually 
become blunted ; the dread of being singular 
operates with diminished power ; resolutions of 
amendment grow weaker, and apologies are more 
readily admitted, until, at no distant period, the 
doors of the heart are thrown open to welcome 
every temptation. No one can know the power 
of this influence, who has never been exposed to 
it ; nor can any one know how much of vigilance 
and resolution are necessary to withstand it, who 
has not made the experiment. 

I must be allowed to say, in this connection, 
that there is no species of sinful indulgence, to 
which the circumstances which I am supposing 
more strongly solicit young men, than sensuality. 
Never was there a more striking illustration of 
this, than occurred in the temptation which Joseph 
had to encounter from the profligate wife of his 
master. She not only invited but urged him into 



64 BANGER FROM LIVING IN A 

" the way to hell " ; and because he resisted her 
cruel solicitations, she took vengeance upon him, 
at the expense of an abominable falsehood. The 
animal appetites make part of our original consti- 
tution ; and when kept in due subjection, they 
accomplish an important end ; but when they are 
suffered to act the part of tyrants, they constitute 
a most degrading ministry in the soul, and as sure 
as the ordinance of heaven changes not, ultimately 
destroy both soul and bod}'' in hell. There is 
scarcely a vice that does not find its legitimate 
aliment in sensuality. While, by its own direct 
influence, it changes the man into a brute, it puts 
other principles of his nature into operation, by 
means of which he becomes also a fiend. While 
I am writing this paragraph, there is the utmost 
excitement prevailing in a neighbouring city, in 
consequence of a most brutal murder that has just 
occurred as the immediate result of licentious 
indulgence ; and the hand of retributive justice 
is, at this moment, searching for the wretched 
murderer, to visit upon him the punishment which 
his crimes have merited. No language could 
adequately set forth the danger to which young 
men are exposed from the vice to which I here 



CORRUPT STATE OF SOCIETY. 65 

refer. It is a subject upon which I cannot dwell; 
though I am willing to hope that this passing 
allusion may serve to awaken or quicken both 
your reflection and sensibility in respect to its 
importance. If other vices have slain their thou- 
sands, it is not too much to say that this has slain 
its ten thousands. 

And while there is much to be feared, in this 
state of things, from the general influence of evil 
example, and the frequent solicitations to criminal 
indulgence, there is perhaps scarcely less danger 
from the direct efforts that will be made to 
propagate errour, and thus to corrupt the very 
fountains of moral feeling. Go into whatever 
place you will, where religion is treated with 
general neglect, and its institutions have little, if 
any thing, more than a nominal existence, and 
you will find, almost of course, that there are 
veterans in infidelity as well as veterans in vice ; 
and it is more than you have a right to expect, 
that men who hate the gospel should keep silence 
respecting it. The spirit of malignity in such a 
case is almost sure to find vent through the lips ; 
and hence infidel arguments are framed, and 
infidel jests circulated ; and while there will be 
5 



66 DANGER FROM LIVING IN A 

many who will stand ready to do service to the 
cause according to their ability, there will be 
some who will be regarded as oracles, or at least 
as the expounders of oracles, at whose feet the 
multitude will sit with persevering and fatal 
docility. I have in my eye, at this moment, a 
neighbourhood with w T hich I was familiar years 
ago, where, owing to some peculiar circumstances, 
a large part of the population had come under a 
strangely demoralizing influence. And that was 
a soil where infidelity grew in rank luxuriance ] 
and while it was itself, to a great extent, the 
occasion of the prevailing immorality, it repro- 
duced itself continually, not only by the direct 
inculcation of its own doctrines, but by the habits 
of practical irreligion which it aimed to establish. 
Well do I remember that, while there were a score 
of people w r ho, in their deep ignorance, could jeer 
at Christianity, and brand it as a cheat, and its 
votaries as knaves or fools, there were some two 
or three who were regarded as the greater lights 
of infidelity, and one in particular, who greatly 
exceeded the rest, if not in the fierceness of his 
malignity, at least in the extent of his knowledge. 
He was the acknowledged expounder of Hume 



CORRUPT STATE OF SOCIETY. 67 

and Gibbon, of Rousseau and Voltaire ; and 
perhaps his favourite author, after all, was Paine ; 
'or nothing was more palatable to those to whom 
1e discoursed, than the vulgar and blasphemous 
jests which make up the " Age of Reason." 
The house of this man was the resort of many of 
his neighbours, especially on the sabbath ; and 
not a few young men who listened to his horrible 
teachings, became as thorough going infidels as 
himself. You can hardly estimate the danger of 
living within the range of such an influence as this; 
and yet something at least analogous to this is 
almost sure to be found, where the general stand- 
ard of morality is greatly depressed. 

It is, moreover, almost a thing of course that, 
in a state of society in which the evil influences 
to which I have already adverted, exist, there 
should be the additional evil of bad books — 
books of infidel or immoral tendency. For as 
this constitutes one of the most efficient instru- 
mentalities for corrupting especially the youthful 
mind, it were not to be expected that those who 
are practised in this species of mischief, and who 
glory in multiplying their followers and their 
victims, should overlook so important an auxiliary. 



68 DANGER FROM LIVING IN A 

Hence we find that these men are usually on the 
alert for putting this class of books in circulation — 
books adapted to every variety of intelligence and 
taste, from the sophistry of Hume down to the 
ribaldry of Paine. Most distinctly do I recollect 
how the individual to whom I have just referred, 
as bearing such sway in an infidel neighbourhood, 
used to avail himself of every book of evil 
tendency within his reach, in carrying forward 
his work of corruption ; and he would even put 
them stealthily into the hands of young men, and 
request that they might be read without meeting 
the eye of their parents. And who can estimate 
the amount of evil which a bad book is adapted 
to produce ? Let it be read and relished, and it 
will be almost sure to be read more than once- 
read till it has impressed itself most fully on the 
mind, and its poison has diffused itself through 
the whole moral system. And let me say, those 
are the most dangerous books in which false and 
demoralizing opinions are blended with high 
literary attractions, so that the former are, in a 
great measure, concealed by the latter. Many a 
young man, in reading the licentious productions 
of Byron, has supposed himself influenced chiefly 



CORRUPT STATE OF SOCIETY. 69 

by admiration of his exalted genius ; but the event 
has proved that the book has permanently corrupted 
his moral sentiments, and perhaps has effected his 
complete ruin for both worlds. 

Perhaps there is no class in whom the social 
principle operates more strongly than in young 
men. Mark it in whatever community you will — 
though the aged and the middle aged may be 
reconciled to a state of comparative seclusion, and 
may sometimes even seek it as a matter of prefer- 
ence, the young are rarely satisfied unless they are 
mingling in some kind of society. Suppose then 
that the society into which a young man is thrown 
is extensively corrupt, while yet he is himself free 
from vicious habits, and under the general influence 
of a good education — the social principle will 
naturally lead him to look for companions ; and 
where there are few, if any, who have not been 
corrupted, how much danger is there that he will 
form intimacies which will work for him the most 
lasting evil. He may, at first, be shocked by their 
loose principles and vicious habits ; and he may 
resolve, from time to time, that he will never go 
beyond a certain point in conforming to their 
wishes ; but, at no distant period, he finds himself 



70 

completely within their power, and perhaps with 
scarcely an effort at resistance, surrenders himself 
to a course which must soon terminate in ruin. 

Need I say, my young friends, that if Provi- 
dence places you in circumstances such as I have 
here described — no matter whether at home 
or abroad — -you will have reason for the exercise 
of unremitted vigilance. Without taking heed 
to your way, continually, you will inevitably 
soon become the prey of the destroyer. If, on the 
other hand, you are preserved from the temptations 
to which such a condition exposes, and have your 
lot cast chiefly among the good and virtuous, be 
thankful to that Providence which thus highly 
favours you, and make good use of the advantages 
which it offers for becoming fitted for any station 
which you may hereafter be called to occupy. 



DANGER FROM, ETC. 71 



LETTER V, 

DANGER FROM BEING SUDDENLY CAST INTO 
ADVERSITY. 

It does not appear that Joseph, previous to the 
sad visit that he made to his brethren at Dothan, 
had had any remarkable experience of the vicissi- 
tudes of human life. He had indeed lost an 
excellent mother — and that is always a severe 
affliction ; but he was too young at the time to 
form any adequate conception of the loss; and 
no doubt his wants had all been promptly met by 
the ever vigilant care and affection of his father. 
But, from the hour that he parted with his father, 
or rather from the hour that he met his brethren, 
his condition underwent a strange and sad reverse ; 
misfortune followed in the track of misfortune, 
till it seemed as if malignity and cruelty had 
exhausted themselves in the effort to render him 
unhappy. How different was the meeting which 
he had with his brethren from that which he had 



72 DANGER FROM BEING SUDDENLY 

anticipated ! Instead of being received by them 
with open arras, as he had a right to expect, the 
first view which they caught of him in the distance 
was a signal for concerting a plan to take his life, 
What must have been his emotions when he found 
that the spirit of murder had got possession of 
their hearts, and that the majority of them were 
actually in favour of shedding his blood ! What 
a moment must that have been when he was cast 
into the pit, and afterwards when he was sold as 
a slave, and was carried away he knew not 
whither, with no other prospect than that of 
perpetual bondage ! As he reverted to the 
quiet and peaceful scenes in which he had so 
lately mingled with his much loved father, and 
then reflected on the treachery and cruelty which 
had been exercised towards him by his brethren ; 
as he thought of the suspense and anguish to 
which his father must be subjected in consequence 
of his not returning to him, and of the depri- 
vations and sufferings which, in all probability, 
awaited himself as a slave, we cannot doubt that 
his heart must have been pierced by the keenest 
agony. And subsequently to this period, you 
remember that he suffered again in consequence of 



CAST INTO ADVERSITY. 73 

the false and cruel representations of an abandoned 
woman, and actually lay in prison until God, by 
a special providence, interposed for his rescue. 
Considering the severity of the afflictions to which 
Joseph was subjected, and the suddenness of his 
transition from prosperity to adversity, you cannot 
fail to perceive that he was placed in circumstances 
of great jeopardy ; and it must have been no 
ordinary strength of virtue that could have enabled 
him to maintain his integrity and innocence. 

There are many young men, whose condition, 
in its general features, is represented by this story 
of the afflictions of Joseph ; for though their 
trials are not of the same kind with his, yet they 
are often both severe and unexpected. For 
instance, a young man, at an early period of his 
education, loses his parents, and henceforward is 
without any near friend to whom he can look 
either for support or counsel. Another, who 
had supposed himself an heir to a large estate, 
suddenly finds out that he is pennyless. Another 
has commenced business with flattering prospects, 
and has no doubt of being able to earn for himself 
a handsome living, when some accidental oversight, 
or some unexpected change in the times, sweeps 



74 DANGER FROM BEING STTBDENLY 

away whatever he has accumulated, and leaves 
him, with a burden of debt resting upon him, to 
begin the world anew. And yet another is disap- 
pointed in respect to a matrimonial connection : 
some attractive female has gained his heart, and 
has perhaps rashly, perhaps deceitfully, promised 
him her hand ; and it may be, after his plans for 
life have been modified with reference to this 
engagement, and every thing has been made ready 
for the joyful consummation, she finds out, in a 
moment of caprice, that he is not the man that 
she loves best ; and away she flies to try the 
strength of her fascinations upon another. You. 
need not smile at my putting this down in the 
list of a young man's afflictions ; for, though it 
is a matter about which some will laugh, and 
almost all will be sparing of their pity, I have no 
doubt you will think, if you ever happen to have 
the experience, that it deserves not only a place 
on the list, but a place much nearer the head of 
it, than you had ever imagined. 

The nature of the danger to which you are 
exposed, must of course depend on the kind of 
affliction which you are called to suffer. But a sad 



CAST IXTO ADVERSITY. 75 

reverse of any kind, especially if it occur suddenly, 
cannot fail greatly to jeopardize your character. 

There is danger, if you are the subject of any 
great and unlooked for affliction, that, instead of 
rousing the energies of your nature, and invoking 
the proffered aids of divine grace to sustain you 
under it, you will yield to discouragement and 
despondency, and thus cheat yourself out of much 
enjoyment, and the world out of much useful 
service. If your earnings, however small, are all 
suddenly swept from you, you are in danger of 
saying to yourself that you have no encouragement 
to labour, and that you will attempt it no more, as 
whatever you may accumulate will be sure, in 
some way or other, to escape from you. If, 
instead of inheriting a large estate, as you had 
expected, you find yourself left in absolute indi- 
gence — here again, how liable will you be to 
sink into an irresolute habit of feeling, and to 
make up your mind that you cannot labour for a 
living, even though your living should come from 
the charity of the world. I have in my eye at 
this moment a young man who has been suddenly 
plunged into deep adversity, not by his own fault, 
but through the righteous providence of God; 



76 DANGER FROM BEING SUDDENLY 

and, for the present, he refuses to be comforted 
by any consideration drawn from earth or Heaven ; 
and, unless the state of his mind shall soon undergo 
an important change, I greatly fear that he will 
become the subject of a permanently desponding 
and morbid habit, which may affect his happiness 
and usefulness for life. 

There is danger also, that the intoxicating cup 
may be resorted to by young men, as the remedy 
for severe trouble ; especially where trouble 
is intimately connected with mortification or 
remorse. If you fancied yourself rich and find 
that you are poor ; if you had fair prospects of 
succeeding in your business, and had expressed a 
confident persuasion of your success, and are 
disappointed, after all ; if you had made your 
arrangements for becoming the head of a family, 
and those arrangements are suddenly defeated by 
duplicity or caprice ; — notwithstanding there 
may be nothing in either case that ought 
to wound your conscience or your character, 
yet it is more than probable you will be stung 
with a sense of mortification. And how shall 
the effect of the disappointment be neutralized, 
and your accustomed spirit and resolution restored 



CAST INTO ADVERSITY. 77 

to you? Many a young man, in these circum- 
stances, has practically answered this question, by 
resorting to the inebriating cup ; and what, at 
first, was taken as an opiate for an uneasy and 
distressed mind, comes, at no distant period, to 
be used to satisfy a diseased and deadly appetite. 
Better a thousand times that trouble should crush 
you into the dust — even into your grave, than 
that it should originate a habit, which, unless it be 
eradicated, must inevitably destroy you, not only 
for the life that now is, but for that which is to 
come. 

There is danger, especially where the affliction 
consists in some sudden reverse in pecuniary 
matters — in being plunged in a moment from a 
state of supposed prosperity into indigence — 
there is danger that fraudulent and even desperate 
means will be resorted to, either to avert the evil 
as it appears in prospect, or to repair the loss 
when it has been actually incurred. A young 
man, when he sees a cloud gathering that 
threatens his best earthly prospects, has the 
strongest inducements to do his utmost to escape 
the impending storm ; or, when he finds himself 
actually suffering the worst evils that he had 



78 DAKGER FROM BEING SUDDENLY 

feared, how natural that he should nerve himself 
for some great effort to regain his lost posses- 
sions ; and, in either case, how strong will be the 
temptation, especially to an ambitious spirit, even 
to compromise the great principles of rectitude, 
and make shipwreck of a good conscience, if the 
desired end may thereby be gained. It is quite 
possible that a young man may have always 
maintained an uncorrupted integrity, and never 
dreamed that he was capable of forfeiting it 
under any circumstances, up to the time that such 
a temptation as I have described presented itself; 
and then he may have learned, for the first time, 
that he was capable of being a knave. His 
principles of honesty were strong enough for 
ordinary circumstances : but when the question 
that presented itself to him involved the alterna- 
tive whether he should submit to poverty or yield 
up his integrity, — he may have perhaps hesitated 
— he may have done it anxiously and tremblingly, 
but he did it — he renounced the character of an 
honest man. 

I will only add that young men, in common 
with persons of every age, are in danger of 
perverting their afflictions to cherish a complaining 






CAST INTO ADVERSITY. 79 

spirit against the providence of God. If God 
sends you afflictions — no matter what kind they 
may be — he has some benevolent purpose in 
sending them ; — he designs, by means of them, to 
prepare you for greater usefulness, and ultimately 
for greater enjoyment. " It is good for a man," 
says Solomon, " that he bear the yoke in his 
youth ;" and wherever afflictions, in the morning 
of life, are rightly improved, they always impart 
a mellowness, a dignity, an elevation to the 
character, which you look for in vain, where no 
other influence has been exerted than that of 
prosperity. But an impatient and complaining 
spirit will not only effectually prevent you from 
realizing these beneficial results, but will render 
your character increasingly unlovely in the eyes 
of both God and man. It will moreover constitute 
the worst possible preparation for other scenes of 
trial which may await you in subsequent life, and 
if it grows into a habit, will oppose a formidable 
obstacle to all those means and influences which 
are designed to prepare you for a better world. 

That you may escape the evils which I have 
mentioned, and al) pther evils to which sudden 
affliction may expose you, let me urge you to 



80 DANGER FROM, ETC. 

recognize a divine providence in every trouble 
that comes upon you, and endeavour to cooperate 
with God for the accomplishment of its legitimate 
purpose in purifying and elevating your character. 
Never seek to avoid an affliction by any means 
which a properly enlightened conscience will not 
justify ; and never be satisfied, if, in the review 
of an affliction, you do not find yourself better 
fitted for future duties and trials, than you were 
before you endured it. 



LETTER VI. 

DANGER FROM BEING ENTRUSTED WITH THE 
INTERESTS OF OTHERS. 

1 have directed your attention, in preceding 
letters, to the condition of Joseph deprived of his 
liberty, and subjected to foreign caprice and 
dictation. But I come now to present him before 
you in a different attitude. Notwithstanding he 
has been sold as a slave, he is not destined long 



DANCER FROM, ETC. 81 

to be treated as a slave. His winning manners, 
his obliging disposition, his exemplary fidelity, 
and his uncommon tact, all combine to recommend 
him to some station above that of a common 
servant. He was soon appointed by his master 
the overseer of his house ; and as his master 
was a man in authority — the captain of the 
king's guard, this must have been a place of 
no inconsiderable responsibility. It is true that 
he lost this place shortly after, by the cruel 
misrepresentations of Potiphar's wife ; but as he 
was accused falsely, he quickly came out from 
under the cloud, and was advanced to a place of 
much more importance than that from which he 
had been ejected. In consequence of his wise 
interpretation of Pharaoh's dream, which was of 
vital importance to the prosperity of the country, 
Pharaoh was pleased to constitute him the chief 
officer in the land ; and, accordingly, after having 
invested him with the appropriate badges of 
authority, he issued his mandate to all his people, 
to treat him with the reverence to which his 
character and office entitled him. Joseph had 
indeed, by this time, advanced to what we should 
now consider middle age; but, considering the 
6 



82 DANGER, FROM BEING ENTRUSTED 

greater length of human life at that period, he 
could be regarded, even at the time when he 
reached his greatest elevation, as only approaching 
his meridian. It will occur to you, at once, that 
it was a perilous situation in which he was now 
placed ; and that, before the experiment had 
resulted, there was much reason to fear that the 
quick transition from being a slave to an overseer, 
and then from being imprisoned as a malefactor to 
being made governour of the whole land, would 
turn out to be not only disastrous to himself, but 
adverse to the interests of those under whom he 
acted, as well as of those who were subjected to 
his control. 

But Joseph is not the only young man, who is 
placed in circumstances of jeopardy, from being 
charged with the interests of others. The most 
important places, especially of publick responsi- 
bility, are not usually occupied by young men ; 
and yet the greater portion of young men have 
some other concerns than their own to manage; 
and sometimes they are charged with matters that 
have a most important bearing on the prosperity 
of individuals, and even of the publick. A young 
man is commissioned to go abroad to transact 



WITH THE INTERESTS OF OTHERS. 83 

business of great moment for a mercantile house ; 
and he may have it in his power greatly to pro- 
mote its prosperity, or to bring upon it extreme 
embarrassment, or even absolute ruin. Another 
is employed as a clerk — perhaps a head clerk, in 
some great mercantile or manufacturing establish- 
ment: his employers confide to him all their 
great pecuniary interests — he has a hand even 
upon the very sources of their prosperity. Another 
occupies the responsible place of a teacher of 
youth, and thereby has committed to him, in a 
great degree, the formation of the character of his 
pupils, and the consequent happiness of their 
parents, and the well being of society. And yet 
another gains some responsible appointment under 
the government of the state or the nation, and 
possibly, in spite of his youth, may sometimes 
have the ear of those whose influence is directly 
felt to the extremities of the land. In these and 
various other situations in which young men are 
placed, though there are great opportunities for 
usefulness, there are also some great temptations 
to evil. There is danger not only that the interests 
committed to them will suffer, but also that they 
will do irreparable injury to themselves. Let me 



84 DANGER FROM BEING ENTRUSTED 

direct your attention to two or three of the promi- 
nent sources of danger. 

There is danger from neglect. There is no 
post of duty which can be successfully occupied 
by an individual who takes little or no interest in 
it. Its duties may indeed be very light, and it 
may require but a small portion of one's time to 
discharge them; but, after all, if there is no 
interest felt in them, light as they are, they will 
be almost sure either to be entirely neglected or 
very imperfectly performed. If you go abroad 
on a mercantile agency, professedly to look after 
the interests of your employer, and yet do not, in 
some measure, make his interests your own, it is 
quite as likely that your agency will embarrass, as 
that it will benefit him. Or, if you are a clerk, 
and look upon every service that devolves upon 
you, as a burden to be submitted to, rather than 
as a duty to be cheerfully performed, you will 
probably entirely omit many things which you 
ought to do, and only imperfectly do those which 
you attempt : thus the accounts of the establish- 
ment may be irregularly kept, opportunities for 
advantageous sales may be needlessly lost, and 
both the reputation and prosperity of the house 



WITH THE INTERESTS OF OTHERS. 85 

may rapidly decline. Or, if you are a teacher, 
and think of nothing but your salary or your ease, 
your pupils, instead of reaping the legitimate 
benefits of sound and wholesome instruction, will 
almost of course contract bad habits both intellec- 
tual and moral ; and not improbably their parents 
may discover, when it is too late to remedy the 
evil, that their children have been only acquiring 
an education for an unprofitable and wretched 
life. Mere neglect in a teacher of youth, without 
any positive intention to do wrong, may occasion 
evils which no subsequent training either of parents 
or teachers, will be able to cure. And so also in 
places of civil trust — places, it may be, not 
greatly elevated, but yet connected either with 
the state or national government — an indifferent 
habit of mind — a mere want of interest in the 
appropriate duties of the station, may bring after 
it consequences of the most serious and ruinous 
import. 

It were well if there were no danger in the 
case I am supposing, except from neglect ; but 
sad experience shows that here also are tempta- 
tions to dishonesty, which, alas ! with melancholy 
frequency, prove too powerful to be resisted. I 



86 DANGER FROM BEING ENTRUSTED 

might specify cases almost without number in 
which young men have been sent out by their 
employers to gather in debts, and some in which 
they have been employed as agents for benevolent 
institutions, in which they have proved recreant 
to all the claims of honesty, and have run off, 
appropriating to themselves the whole amount 
of their collections. But I would direct your 
attention here more particularly to the case of a 
merchant's clerk — of a young man who goes 
into a counting-house with a view to acquire a 
commercial education. It is quite possible that 
he may have had the obligations of truth and 
integrity inculcated upon him from his earliest 
years, and his conduct may never have betrayed, 
even to the most scrutinizing observer, the least 
delinquency on this subject. But the secret of 
this may be, that he has never yet been subjected 
to any great temptation. Perhaps he is placed in 
circumstances in which vice solicits with greater 
power than at any previous period of his life ; 
and first he is brought into the attitude of dallying 
with the tempter, and finally he determines to 
yield. But the class of vicious indulgences to 
which he is tempted are expensive— at the close 



WITH THE INTERESTS OF OTHERS. 87 

of a midnight revel there is a bill to be paid ; and 
yet his parents have provided him with money- 
only to meet his necessary expenses. He casts 
about him for some additional means ; and it 
occurs to him that there is plenty of money in the 
drawer of his employer ; and that he may venture 
secretly to borrow a little to be replaced the 
moment that his funds are a little replenished. 
He borrows again and again, making himself easy 
in the reflection that he fully intends to pay, 
though he becomes less and less scrupulous in 
regard to the time of payment. Meanwhile he 
keeps no account of what he takes, and is more 
than willing to be ignorant of the extent of his 
obligation. But, at no very distant day, he gives 
up the idea of replacing what he withdraws, 
and agitates in his mind another question — to 
what extent he can proceed without too much 
danger of detection? As he makes progress in 
vice, especially if he be addicted to gaming, his 
wants proportionally increase ; and in the same 
proportion, he becomes adventurous in his frauds. 
By some unexpected means, he is at length found 
out : if he gets timely warning, perhaps he 
escapes the hand of justice ; or, perhaps before he 



8$ DANGER FROM BEING ENTRUSTED 

has suspected the danger of apprehension, the 
magistrate has shown him his warrant for remov- 
ing him from the counting-house to the prison. 
And this may be the beginning of an exile for 
many years from all society except that of felons 
— from all privileges except those which can be 
enjoyed in a dungeon. It is unnecessary that I 
should point to particular cases to illustrate what 
I have here said ; for I am sure your own recol- 
lection will supply you with some in which you 
will recognize the most painful features to which I 
have adverted. 

There is danger, moreover, in certain cases, 
that there will be an abuse of authority to purposes 
of excessive lenity on the one hand, or of down- 
right tyranny on the other. You are entrusted 
with the management of some large establishment, 
and it devolves on you to see that all who are 
below you are actively and industriously occu- 
pied, while yet they are not tasked beyond 
reasonable bounds. Now you may do great 
injustice to those who employ you, by conniving 
at the indolence or carelessness of those whom 
you are required to look after; or you may be 
no less unjust U> them on the other hand by 



"WITH THE INTERESTS OF OTHERS. 89 

exacting of them a greater amount of labour than 
they can reasonably be required to perform. Or 
you are engaged in the business of teaching youth 
— you virtually yield up your authority by 
leaving them to take their own way; or else 
you task them so severely, or meet them with so 
little encouragement, that they grow weary and 
disheartened, and avail themselves of the first 
opportunity to escape from your control. I have 
known children of at least an ordinary degree of 
promise, who, by reason of the injudicious treat- 
ment they have received from their teachers, 
have had the development of their faculties most 
unreasonably checked, and have borne witness 
to the evil which they have suffered, to the close 
of life. 

You cannot, my young friends, estimate the 
importance of the subject of this letter so highly 
as it deserves. I pray you to hold it to your 
minds, till you are brought fully to realize your 
danger, and you feel that you have the strength 
requisite to meet it successfully. Whether the 
interests with which you are charged are greater 
or less, guard them just as sacredly, aim to 
promote them just as carefully* as if they were 



90 DANGER FROM COMING BTTO 

exclusively your own. Nay, hesitate not to 
submit to great inconvenience, rather than even 
appear to be unfaithful in respect to any trust 
that has been committed to you. Be as cautious 
as you will, how you assume responsibilities ; but 
when assumed, sooner part with your right arm, 
than trifle with them. Act up fully to all your 
promises — to all that can reasonably be expected 
of you. And remember that the least tendency 
that you discover in yourself to depart from this 
rule points with ominous foreboding — perhaps to 
the life of a vagabond— perhaps to the dungeon 
of a felon. 



LETTER VII. 

DANGER FROM COMING INTO POSSESSION OF GREAT 
WEALTH. 

It does not follow, as a matter of course, in these 
days, that because a man occupies a station of 
great influence in society, he should have great 



POSSESSION OF GREAT WEALTH. 91 

worldly possessions ; for nothing is more common 
than for an individual to hold one of the highest 
posts of civil authority, to have the control, to a 
great extent, of the public treasury, and to have 
a hand, more or less directly, on the springs of 
national prosperity, and yet to have little or no 
property that is, strictly speaking, his own. But 
this does not seem to have been the case with 
Joseph. The constitution of society, at the period 
in which he lived, identified his exaltation to the 
office of governour with the greatest affluence ; 
and the manner in which he provided for his 
father's family, shows that the most ample 
resources were at his command. And the eleva- 
tion from poverty to wealth was as sudden as can 
well be imagined ; for the governour was made out 
of the prisoner, just as quickly as the prison dress 
could be taken off and the robes of office put on. 
But a few years before, Joseph was a poor boy, 
with only the comforts and the prospects of a 
slave ; and though his prospects had at one time 
been brighter, yet they had become overcast again, 
and he was actually imprisoned, on a false accu- 
sation, as a felon ; but, in a moment, like the 
sun suddenly emerging from a dark cloud, he is 



92 DANGER FROM COMING INTO 

placed in a situation in which the last vestige of 
poverty retires from him, and the treasures of 
Egypt are all put at his disposal. It was a 
situation fraught with imminent danger — danger 
not only from the authority that was committed to 
him, but from the wealth which w r as its necessary 
accompaniment. 

There are various ways in which it happens 
to many young men of the present day to be 
suddenly elevated to great affluence. This occurs 
frequently through the ordinary channel of inher- 
itance : the individual finds himself rich, because 
his parents were rich before him, and as they 
have been removed by death, the estate, as a 
matter of course, falls into his hands. In this 
case, there is no sudden change experienced ; for 
the young man had always been surrounded with 
elegances and luxuries, and had always known 
that he was the lawful heir to the estate, whenever 
the decease of his parents should occur. But it 
sometimes happens that a large fortune is be- 
queathed to a youth, who had always been poor, 
by some individual from whom he had no right to 
expect any legacy at all: possibly while he is 
hard at work at some mechanical trade, which 



POSSESSION OF GREAT WEALTH. 93 

furnishes him only the means of a scanty sub- 
sistence, his eye rests on a paragraph in the 
newspaper, announcing that some one — perhaps 
on the other side of the ocean — has mentioned 
his name in his will, in a way that elevates him 
at once to a place among the richest men in the 
community. And there are other cases still in 
which young men suddenly emerge from poverty 
to wealth, by means of some fortunate speculation 
— possibly by the drawing of a prize in a lottery, 
or by a great and un looked for rise in the value of 
the little property which they have acquired, or 
by some other circumstance which they had never 
contemplated as possible, until it actually occurred. 
Let the property have been acquired in whatever 
manner it may, [ will endeavour to show you that 
the mere possession of it, however it should be 
regarded as a blessing to be borne in grateful 
remembrance, may nevertheless prove a snare 
from which, if you once fall into it, you may not 
easily extricate yourself. 

What then are some of the dangers to which 
young men are peculiarly exposed from coming 
into the possession of extensive riches? 

There is danger that they will form a habit of 



94 DANGER FROM DOMING INTO 

indolence — indolence as it respects both the body 
and the mind. I have adverted to this subject 
already in what 1 have said respecting excessive 
parental indulgence ; but it is too important to be 
entirely passed over in the present connexion. 
Nothing is more certain than that the mind is 
constituted with such tendencies, as to require 
some powerful influence from without to keep it 
active; and there is no influence more effective 
than that which results from necessity ; and no 
necessity more imperious than that which is iden- 
tified with the means of our present subsistence. 
If a young man has never formed the habit of 
applying his faculties in any useful way, the fact 
of his being able to live without exertion, will in 
all probability prevent his ever forming such a 
habit; or if he actually does form it, it will be a 
wonderful triumph of the better principles of his 
nature. If. on the contrary, he has already 
become an active young man, under the influence 
of the conviction that he must labour for his 
sustenance — though it may be more easy to 
continue the habit of activity than it would be to 
form it anew, — yet there is great danger that 
the shock occasioned by the discovery that he 



POSSESSION OF GREAT WEALTH. 95 

is independent, may cause a general listless- 
ness to come over him, fatal alike to his 
reputation and usefulness. These are evils, you 
will observe, not essentially incident to the case 
of which I am treating; — for if they were so, 
your duty, not less than your interest, would 
require that you should never, in any circum- 
stances, consent to possess a large estate ; whereas 
a large estate rightly used is certainly a great 
blessing ; — but, after all, they are evils which so 
frequently occur, that you cannot guard against 
them with too scrupulous vigilance. Remember 
that man answers the end of his existence, just in 
proportion as his faculties are brought into action 
in the right way ; and whatever is suffered to 
operate as a clog to their exercise, is an occa- 
sion of evil which you cannot now adequately 
estimate. 

The spirit to which I have here referred, once 
fully imbibed, is a fruitful soil of evil affections 
and evil habits ; for it is a rare thing that you see 
indolence, whether associated with wealth or 
poverty, without seeing other vices of a more 
positive character clustering around it. Intem- 
perance and sensuality particularly are very likely 



96 DANGER FROM COMING INTO 

to be its concomitants ; and along with these often 
come scenes of turmoil and violence, the report of 
which brings out the energies of the law. Young 
men, who have great estates, often feel as if the 
law is not made for such as themselves, and imagine 
that their wealth will secure to them an exemption 
from its penalty ; but they soon find out to their 
cost that the law asks no other question concerning 
them, than whether they are offenders ; and that 
" the rich and the poor meet together " before the 
tribunal of their country, as well as in the grave. 
There is a tradition, which I believe is quite 
authentic, that the late king of England, when he 
was in this country, soon after he emerged from 
boyhood, fell into a spree in the city of New- 
York, with some of his companions, and was 
arrested by the civil authority and shut up in a 
guard-house. He was a king's son, and destined 
to be a king himself, and his inheritance, so far as 
property was concerned, was to be that of a royal 
prince ; — and doubtless this very circumstance 
might have emboldened him to the riotous act for 
which he was arrested ; but it turned out that he 
was a subject of law in common with the most 
vulgar offender. 



POSSESSION OF GREAT WEALTH, 97 

Where these greater excesses are not realized 
as the consequence of a young man's being 
elevated to great wealth, there are often other 
evils which, if less flagrant in their bearing on 
the general interests of society, have scarcely a 
less injurious effect on the individuals themselves 
— I refer especially to the spirit of ostentation 
and luxury — to every thing that is included in 
the pride of life. How common is it for young 
men, to whom Providence has given great wealth. 
to practise the greatest extravagance in respect 
to their establishments — their dwelling, their 
furniture, their equipage, their general mode of 
living ; imagining that this is not only the way 
to enjoy life best, but to secure for themselves 
the most enviable reputation ! But the common 
sense of the world, and even their own common 
sense, if they would bring it into exercise, is 
against them. In the first place, there is nothing 
in all this that meets their nobler desires; — and 
more than that — familiarity leads to satiety, and 
satiety produces disgust. A small proportion of 
the expense which they actually incur, would 
procure for them all the real comforts which 
they enjoy ; and the balance is much worse than 
7 



98 DANGER FROM COMING INTO 

thrown away; — for it only mingles neutralizing, 
if not absolutely bitter, ingredients in their cup. 
And then what is the effect upon others ? A few 
may indeed be weak enough to envy such a person, 
and his condition may be conformed to their 
very ideal of human happiness ; but those whose 
opinion is of any value, will pity him as a poor, 
weak, vain young man. Even if he actually 
possesses some estimable qualities, they will be 
thrown not a little into the shade, by being 
associated with this miserable passion for worldly 
splendour. 

But it is possible that a young man may possess 
great wealth, and may not be liable to the impu- 
tation even of extravagance — he may do nothing 
more than live in a style which his property 
justifies, and his standing in society requires : and 
yet, after all, he may be deeply injured by his 
wealth — he may be, in the worst sense, a victim 
to it. For he may be proud of his great posses- 
sions, even when his pride does not take the form 
of ostentation — especially he may be proud of 
his reputation in the community as a rich man — 
proud of the respect and influence which his 
riches procure for him in the circle in which he 



POSSESSION OF GREAT WEALTH. 99 

moves. He may accumulate upon himself the 
guilt of turning away from the supplications of 
the needy, or of refusing to aid in the extension 
of the gospel, when the most abundant means for 
meeting these demands are within his reach. He 
may lose sight of his dependance on God, and 
refuse to acknowledge his providence in his 
munificent gifts, and settle down, to all intents 
and purposes, into a practical atheist. Indeed 
his heart may become as hard as the nether mill 
stone, and the prospect of an aggravated Condem- 
nation may open before him, by reason of the 
abuse of his wealth ; while many a young man 
who has not been set in such a slippery place, is 
cultivating, under a different influence, benevolent 
and generous dispositions, and is sustained by the 
prospect of a glorious reward. 

As an antidote to the dangers which I have 
brought to your consideration in this letter, let 
me entreat you to guard against the illusive glare 
of wealth. Remember that all the wealth of the 
world could never render you happy; — for this 
obvious reason — that your Creator designed that 
you should find your highest happiness in nobler 
objects. Remember that you hold your wealth 



100 DANGER FROM, ETC. 

as stewards; and that, however you may forget 
your character in this respect, another day will 
convince you of its reality. Remember, in short, 
that wealth is a blessing or a curse, as it is used 
for good or perverted to evil. Ponder that mo- 
mentous problem which fell from the lips of the all 
wise and all gracious Saviour — " What shall it 
profit a man. if he gain the whole world and lose 
his ow r n soul?" 

I here conclude what I had designed to say in 
respect to the dangers to which young men are 
exposed, as suggested by the history of Joseph ; 
and, in my next letter, shall proceed to another 
branch of my general subject— viz. the various 
praiseworthy qualities which were developed in 
Joseph's character, and which are worthy not only 
to be venerated but imitated, by every young 
man, 






PART II. 

CHARACTER TO WHICH YOUNG MEN 
SHOULD ASPIRE. 



LETTER VIII, 

INTEGRITY. 

I have presented Joseph before you in various 
circumstances of temptation, and have shown you 
that, in each of the different situations in which 
he was placed, his experience was not unlike that 
which falls to the lot of many young men at the 
present day. Having considered the dangers to 
which he was exposed, I wish now to direct your 
attention to the spirit in which he encountered 
them : in other words, to bring before you the 
leading features of his character, as they are 
developed in his history. 



102 INTEGRITY. 

And here, before I proceed to notice the 
particular qualities of which the character of 
Joseph was made up, it is proper that I should 
premise that his noble and virtuous dispositions 
all had their origin in true religion. We have 
indeed no account of the time or the manner in 
which he became religious ; but it is reasonable 
to infer from the inspired narrative, either that he 
was sanctified from his birth, or that divine grace 
wrought effectually on his heart in early child- 
hood, through the influence of parental fidelity. 
For, to say nothing of the fact 1 that he was 
divinely honoured by prophetic dreams while he 
was a mere child, every thing that is recorded of 
his earlier years, evinces the clean heart and the 
right spirit ; and the same principle which marked 
his first developments of character, waxed stronger 
and stronger, till his character was matured by 
manhood, and finally sealed by death. 

It may possibly occur to you to inquire how far 
the religion of Joseph was the same with that 
which it is the design of these letters to urge upon 
you — in other words, how far the patriarchal 
religion was identical with Christianity. I reply, 
they are the same in substance — the only differ- 



INTEGRITY. 103 

ence is, that the one is a less complete, the other 
a more complete development. The religion of 
the patriarchs differs essentially from the religion 
of nature in this — that, while the latter recognizes 
man in an unfallen state, and therefore not requiring 
the interposition of a Mediator, the former regards 
him as a sinner, and includes the great principle of 
salvation by grace. This principle is indeed only 
dimly shadowed forth, when compared with the 
clearness of subsequent dispensations ; but still it 
is there ; and it is justly as truly the distinguishing 
principle of the patriarchal as of the Christian 
system. And there is the same substantial identity 
in respect to the duties which the two systems 
inculcate. They both differ from natural religion 
in that they require duties corresponding to the 
new relations into which men are brought by the 
mediatorial economy; but they harmonize with 
natural religion in requiring a perfect character ; 
and they differ from each other only in the different 
degrees of responsibility, consequent on the differ- 
ent degrees of light, which they respectively 
involve. The religion which made Joseph what 
he was, is, to all practical purposes, the same 
which must constitute the basis of every truly 



104 INTEGRITY. 

virtuous character now : though you must not fail 
to bear in mind that a brighter light than Joseph 
ever beheld, shines around you ; and that M unto 
whomsoever much is given, of him will be much 
required. 5 ' 

Having said thus much in regard to the ruling 
principle of Joseph's life — the stock on which his 
good qualities were all engrafted. I beg now to 
call your attention to those qualities somewhat in 
detail ; and the first on which I purpose to dwell 
is that which is indicated by the title of this 
letter — integrity. 

Joseph's sterling integrity came out in all the 
conduct of his life. It was manifest in the manner 
in which he discharged all his personal and official 
duties : but was never more strikingly displayed 
on any occasion, than that on which he resisted 
the wiles of a base woman, at the expense of 
being shut up in a dungeon. But that you may 
form a suitable estimate of the importance of this 
virtue, allow me to dwell a little upon its nature, 
and the elements of which it is composed. 

Integrity literally signifies soundness — as used 
figuratively, it denotes moral rectitude. And yet 
this definition, in its application to man in his 



INTEGRITY. 105 

present state, requires to be guarded and limited ; 
for there is no man whose actions, intentions, 
feelings, are all conformed to the perfect standard 
of God's law, as were those of our first parents 
before the fall. In the present state of human 
nature, every man who has not been the subject 
of a spiritual renovation, is under the controlling 
influence of a corrupt heart ; and even those on 
whom the renovating process has passed, are still, 
to an extent, heirs of corruption and children of 
disobedience. Even such a man as David had 
constant occasion to mourn over his iniquities ; 
and Paul, eminent as he was for his devotedness 
to Christ, complained of a law in his members 
warring against the law of his mind, and bringing 
him into captivity to the law of sin and death. 
Neither David nor Paul then was upright in the 
same sense that Adam w r as, or that glorified saints 
in Heaven now are. It is only in a modified 
sense that this word can be considered ai 
describing the characters of even the best men on 
earth. What then are the elements of Christian 
integrity ? 

It has its beginning in a correct moral discern- 
ment — in that state of the mind that renders it 



106 INTEGRITY. 

susceptible of clear perceptions of right and 
wrong. No doubt it is much easier, in most 
cases, to know the right than to do it : and yet, 
such is the influence of depravity upon our whole 
moral constitution, that we are exceedingly prone 
to err even in our moral judgments. There is 
the influence of selfishness, of prejudice, of pas- 
sion, of example, which operates to bring a film 
over the eye of the mind, or at least so to impair 
the moral vision that its views become distorted 
and false. Hence we read of those who call evil 
good, and good evil : who put sweet for bitter 
and bitter for sweet. And hence we find the great 
apostle declaring in reference to himself previous 
to his conversion, — ( * I verily thought with myself 
that I ought to do many things contrary to the 
name of Jesus of Nazareth." And the same 
thing, substantially, we see passing in the world 
every day. There are some men who, by a long 
course of flagrant vice, seem to have lost all moral 
discernment, their consciences being absolutely 
seared : while there are many others of whose 
general character we may judge favourably, who 
yet, through some unhallowed influence, become 
strangely blinded to the right in respect to some 



INTEGRITY. 107 

particular subject, and perhaps are carried far 
away from the path of duty, while they are not 
conscious of having forsaken it at all. But 
inasmuch as man is a moral agent, he is respon- 
sible for this state of mind by which he is misled : 
he is bound to resist all those influences by which 
his discernment of truth and duty is liable to be 
impaired. And it is only in proportion as a man 
does resist these influences that he can be said to 
be upright It can never be an apology for one's 
doing wrong, that he thinks he is doing right, so 
long as God has constituted him with the power 
of judging correctly, and he has voluntarily 
sacrificed this high prerogative of his nature 
to the indulgence of depravity. I repeat then, 
integrity has its beginning in a correct moral 
discernment. 

This however is only its beginning ; for it 
implies also a disposition to act in accordance 
with right views, or to carry out correct moral 
judgments into the life. It is no uncommon thing 
for persons to fly in the face of their own honest 
convictions : with a full knowledge of what is 
right, urged on by the influence of some evil 
propensity, they plunge deeply, irrecoverably, 



108 INTEGRITY. 

into the wrong. And then again, there are many 
more who are convinced where the path of duty 
lies, and who externally walk in that path : and 
yet, after all, it is a constrained obedience which 
they render — the heart is not in it — it is rnerely 
a tribute to conscience, or perhaps to publick 
opinion ; and it is only for the want of courage 
that they are not seen walking in the way of the 
ungodly, and sitting m the scoffer's seat. The 
latter of these classes may indeed have more 
of the appearance of integrity than the former ; 
but they have not a particle more of the genuine 
quality. The truly upright man, while he sin- 
cerely desires to know what his duty is. as sin- 
cerely desires to do it. And in the performance of 
the external act, he is governed not merely by 
a regard to his own conscience, but by a respect 
to God's authority — by a cordial approbation and 
love of moral rectitude. K Lord, what wilt thou 
have me to do T n is a prayer that is often 
breathed forth from his heart and his lips; and he 
walks habitually in the light that shines upon his 
path, in answer to this prayer. 

You will perceive, from these remarks, that the 
scripture meaning of the word integrity is far more 



INTEGRITY. 109 

comprehensive than the meaning which common 
use gives to it. We are accustomed to speak of 
a man as possessing integrity of character, if he is 
honest in his dealings with his fellow men : if he 
is above all unfair and disingenuous dealing, and 
moves forward continually in a plain and open 
path. And this certainly is an admirable trait ; 
and though it does not necessarily involve a prin- 
ciple of true religion in the heart, it marks one of 
the noblest forms of human character that can 
exist without that principle. But integrity, in 
the large and scriptural sense, is quite a different 
thing : it implies a sincere desire and constant 
aim to do our ichole duty; — our duty to God as 
well as to man; — our duty in every relation we 
sustain — in every condition in which we are 
placed. 

Let me urge you them my young friends, while 
you cultivate this general integrity of character 
founded in Christian principle, to see to it that it 
gives a complexion to all the particular actions 
of your life. I refer here more especially to the 
discharge of your social duties — to the relations 
into which you are brought with your fellow 
men in your ordinary pursuits : and I beg you to 



110 INTEGRITY. 

remember that no integrity is genuine that is not 
universal and particular, and especially that does 
not discover itself in the details of worldly 
business. 

You are destined to be a mechanic — to gain 
your living by selling the product of your own 
labour. And this is an honourable vocation 3 
provided only it be pursued with integrity. But 
see to it that integrity regulates the price of every 
article that you make. Never even seem to take 
advantage of the necessities of your customers — 
to extort from them an unreasonable price for an 
article, because you know they must have it, 
and that you alone can supply them. And if 
you engage to do a piece of work, be sure that 
the quality of it comes up, in every respect, to the 
spirit of your engagement — that there be no just 
ground for complaint, either in respect to the 
material of which it is made, or the labour that 
is bestowed upon it. And when }^ou promise, see 
that your promise is fulfilled to the very letter. 
If you promise with a view to accommodate your 
customers, and then fail to fulfil for the sake of 
accommodating yourself, you will be obliged at 
least to practise some self-deception, in order to 



INTEGRITY. Ill 

take the comfort of thinking that you are a person 
of integrity. 

Or you are training up to be a tradesman — to 
spend your days in buying and selling goods. 
And here again, you are in good business enough, 
if you hold fast a good conscience. Suppose 
you have made a bad bargain for yourself, and 
have been deceived in some extensive purchase, 
and have paid double the sum which the goods 
were really worth — what course does integrity 
require — what course does it permit you to take? 
Are you at liberty to endeavour to get back your 
money at all events, — even though you have 
to practise the same deception upon others that 
has actually been practised upon you? By no 
means — not even if the alternative is, that you 
must be reduced to absolute poverty. But sup- 
pose your neighbours around you are given to 
the practice of misrepresenting their goods, and 
over-reaching their customers, as often as they 
have opportunity ; and it seems to you that your 
only chance of making yo-ur way among them, is, 
occasionally at least, to stoop to the same thing — 
rather than do it, even in a single instance, shut 
up your store, and if need be, turn hewer of wood 



112 INTEGRITY. 

or drawer of water. If you are inquired of in 
respect to the state of the market, let your reply 
be an honest one, however it may affect your 
own interest. Think not to retain a customer 
at the expense even of the semblance of mis- 
representation. Choose rather that a man should 
leave your store with the impression that you 
are a strictly honest merchant, though he may 
not have traded with you the value of a 
penny, than that he should leave behind him 
his thousands and go aw y doubting your 
integrity. 

Or you are looking forward to the profession of 
medicine — it may not have occurred to you that 
here is any field for the practice of dishonesty ; 
and yet, in truth, there is scarcely any vocation in 
life that opens a wider one. You may set at 
defiance the dictates of integrity in the charges 
which you make for your services ; and you may 
encourage yourself in exorbitant demands by the 
reflection that a physician's bill is one of the last 
that most people like to dispute. In opposition 
to this, you are to regulate your charges by a 
strict sense of justice, to say nothing of charity 
in extraordinary cases — you are not to estimate 



INTEGRITY. 113 

your services more highly than well judging and 
impartial persons around you would estimate them. 
But, if you may not be dishonest in your charges, 
neither may you be dishonest in your practice. 
I do not mean that a physician is bound always 
instantly to reveal every apprehension he may 
have in respect to the character or the issue of a 
disease, either to the patient or the patient's 
friends — this no doubt would, in many cases at 
least, be an injudicious — possibly a fatal course. 
But I do protest, in the name of all integrity, 
against that faithless dealing on the part of 
physicians, which aims to conceal danger to the 
last, — which actually equivocates and even lies 
to accomplish it, — which leaves the poor patient 
to find out his real situation first, when he is in 
the act of dying, — and which overwhelms his 
friends with an agony rendered doubly bitter by 
the fact that they have had no opportunity to 
prepare for it. I counsel you to be prudent in 
these delicate and difficult circumstances ; but 
never utter a word that shall violate your sober 
convictions. I could give you many reasons for 
this j but it is enough to say that there are no 
8 



114 INTEGRITY. 

possible circumstances that can absolve you from 
the obligation of keeping a good conscience. 

Perhaps you have in view the legal profession — 
a glorious profession it is : and yet how miserably 
prostituted by the petty arts of quibbling and 
misrepresentation. But even here, it is quite 
possible to be an honest man — }"ea. an eminent 
example of integrity; and such you must be. if 
you will be, in the best sense, an ornament to the 
profession. Never voluntarily enlist in a cause 
which you are satisfied is wrong and ought not to 
prevail : unless indeed you may be legally and 
officially designated for the defence of some 
unhappy creature, who has forfeited perhaps even 
his life into the hands of publick justice, but 
who nevertheless is entitled to a trial by the laws 
of his country. Never encourage men to go to 
law r j merely from the expectation that you shall be 
able to make money out of the case : and fail not 
to do what you can to terminate a litigation at the 
earliest moment possible. In your management of 
every cause, show yourself frank and manly, and 
never take undue advantage of your adversary. I 
remember to have heard of a Rhode Island lawyer, 
who had advanced some false principles as points 



INTEGRITY. 115 

of law : and when his antagonist, on retiring from 
the court room, expressed his surprise that he 
should have made such declarations, knowing them, 
as he did, to be false — he facetiously replied, 
* Oh I said it as a lawyer and not as a man." 
: * E ;:.'" rejoined his antagonist, ;; when the devil 
comes after the lawyer, what will become of the 
man 

Some of you — and this is the last supposition 
I will make — may become professional politi- 
cians ; or even, if this should not be the case, 
you may have — doubtless will have — more or 
less to do with political life. I am aware that it 
has come to pass, at this day, that to speak of an 
honest politician is regarded as well nigh a solecism. 
But this should not be so. Washington and Jay 
and Rush were politicians — they had a hand 
directly on the great political interests of the 
country, during some of the most critical periods 
of its history. And yet the country has never 
seen men of more stern and incorruptible integrity 
than they. Let such men as these be your 
models ; and when you reach the point where 
you can no longer remain in political life, and 
exemplify the character which adorned them in 



1 1 6 INTEGRITY. 

respect to integrity, let that be the point that 
shall mark your withdrawal into some other 
sphere of publick or private usefulness. Rely on 
it. your country will never need your services as 
a politician a single day after you have yielded 
up a good conscience. Resolve then that you 
will never be the tool or the slave of any party 
— that you will never appear to endorse measures 
which you conscientiously disapprove — that you 
will stand up for the right, even in the hottest 
political contest, though, in doing so. you should 
stand absolutely alone. To deserve the name of 
an honest politician at this day. is to possess a 
degree of conscientious:: ess and firmness, which 
must render one proof against the strongest 
temptations, and render one safe in the lion's den 
or in ZN"ebuchadnez7«r's furnace. 



DILIGENCE, 117 



LETTER IX. 



DILIGENCE. 



You cannot, I think, have failed to be struck 
with the fact that every part of Joseph's history 
shows him to have been a man of most active 
habits. The places which he successively occu- 
pied both under Potiphar and Pharaoh, were 
places of great responsibility : and each involved 
duties which never could have been performed by 
one. whose faculties were not trained to vigorous 
exercise. It was while he was diligently engaged 
in the duties of his vocation, that the temptation 
was presented to him, which, on account of the 
resistance which he opposed to it, cost him a 
temporary imprisonment : and, even while he 
was in prison, he had an important trust com- 
mitted to him, which must have furnished him 
with incessant occupation. 

I design to present Joseph before you in this 
letter, chiefly as a model of diligence ; but I shall 



118 DILIGEJsXE, 

consider the subject in its largest sense, and may 
connect with it some other things which, however 
legitimately drawn from the history, may, perhaps 
with equal propriety, be referred to some other 
general attribute of character. 

The first thing that here deserves your consid- 
eration, is the selection of a suitable field on which 
your diligence is to be displayed ; for, if you 
mistake here, you put at hazard both your 
comfort and usefulness for life. I am well aware 
that parents should have something to say on 
this subject ; and if I were addressing them, I 
should venture to suggest to them some counsels 
and cautions in relation to it ; but if parents are 
discreet, they will be guided in the part which 
they take by the same considerations which ought 
to influence you. I would say that, in selecting 
your vocation for life, (for I here take for granted 
that you are to have some fixed employment) you 
should have respect, first of all, to your own 
particular capabilities. I say particular capabili- 
ties, for though all men are constituted with the 
same general faculties, yet all do not possess them 
in equal degrees of strength : nor are the same 
particular faculties always predominant in different 



DILIGENCE. 119 

individuals. Hence it frequently happens that, 
while an individual is admirably fitted for one 
kind of business, he has scarcely any talent for 
another — of course his usefulness must depend:, 
in a great measure, on his selecting the employ- 
ment to which he is adapted. You must also 
have respect, in no small degree, to your own 
taste ; for it rarely happens that a young man 
succeeds in any occupation to which he is consti- 
tutionally averse ; though you must not let this 
principle carry you so far, as to furnish an apology 
for engaging in any employment that is not useful 
ind praiseworthy. And finally, you must have 
no small regard to the circumstances in which 
Providence places you ; for that in which it might 
be clearly your duty to engage, in one set of 
circumstances, it might be your imperative duty 
to decline, in another. For instance, I have 
known young men whose predilections would 
have led them to missionary life, who have never- 
theless been deterred from devoting themselves to 
it, by the consideration that they had aged parents 
who were entirely dependant upon them, and who 
would be likely to suffer if they were to leave 
them for a distant country, And I have coi> 



120 DILIGENCE. 

sidered their decision as honourable alike to their 
good judgment and their filial affection. It 
happened in respect to Joseph, that the several 
considerations which I have mentioned, were 
evidently united in determining his sphere of 
action. The admirable manner in which he 
acquitted himself in the different stations which 
he occupied, showed that he possessed the requi- 
site talents for the duties that devolved upon 
him; and though he never betrayed the least 
ambition for high places, and only accepted of 
them when they were offered" to him, or rather 
when he was appointed to them by superior 
authority, it is evident from the graceful manner 
in which he always filled them, that he had, to 
say the least, no constitutional aversion to the 
class of duties which they imposed upon him. 
And as to the indications of Providence arising 
from the circumstances in which he was placed — 
nothing could be more decisive : Potiphar made 
him overseer of his house, when he was a poor 
slave ; and Pharaoh made him governour of the 
land, when he was shut up in prison ; and surely 
no one could doubt, in either case, whether it 
were not better to accept a station of dignity and 



DILIGENCE. 121 

usefulness, than to remain in a state of bondage 
or of imprisonment. It does not appear that he 
had ever any occasion even to hesitate in regard 
to what sphere of usefulness he should occupy; 
and even if such occasion had existed, he had no 
parents or relatives near him, to consult. But it 
will be well for you, to take the advice of those 
who are best qualified to give it, both in respect 
to your natural capabilities and the circumstances 
in which you are placed. And let me say that it 
is a matter of no small moment that your first 
decision on this subject be your ultimate one; 
for, though there are cases in which a young man 
who is educated for one profession succeeds well 
in another, yet it much more frequently happens 
that the habits of thought and action which have 
been contracted with reference to one sphere of 
life, are found materially to interfere with success 
in a different one. I would, by no means, say 
that such a change may not sometimes be made 
to advantage ; but it is often the bartering away of 
eminence for mediocrity ; and no young man, in 
fixing on a profession, should allow the possibility 
of making such a change to enter into his calcu- 
lations. He may indeed remain, for some time, 



122 DILIGENCE. 

undecided : and so he ought to remain till he can 
reach an intelligent and satisfactory conclusion : 
but when he has once formed his purpose, unless 
he may subsequently have some very special 
reasons for a change, let it be like the laws of the 
Medes and Persians. 

If you have advanced far enough in life to be 
able to understand these letters, (and if you have 
not, you belong not to the class for which they 
are designed.) you have, or ought to have, a 
regular routine of daily duties: — for even though 
you may not have determined what is to be your 
occupation for life, yet you are. or should be. in 
the course of your education for some permanent 
occupation or other. Whether you are at school. , 
or at college, or in a mercantile house, or in a 
lawyer's office, or have actually begun the world 
for yourself, you are to be occupied chiefly with 
the particular employment to which you profess 
to be devoted. You must not suffer yourself to 
be needlessly called off from your appropriate 
duties — especially you must not allow the intru- 
sion of indolent and unprofitable acquaintances; 
or, if they come once, you must let them know by 
your manner, if not by your words, that your maxim 



DILIGEKCE. 123 

is " Duty before pleasure." Even if you are 
sometimes placed in circumstances in which the 
difficulty of your daily task is greatly increased, 
still endeavour, if possible, to perform it ; for, 
while you can never know but that the failure, in 
a single instance, may be the commencement of a 
general habit of neglect, you may rest assured that 
the triumph which persevering fidelity in these 
circumstances ensures to you, will be worth more 
than you can imagine, to your stability and dignity 
and self respect. 

Be not satisfied with going through the form of 
the various duties that devolve upon you ; but be 
careful that every thing that you attempt is done 
in the best possible manner. Some persons who 
do not wholly forget their duties, and are not 
disposed to pass them by without some attention, 
perform them in such a careless and slovenly 
manner that they might nearly as well have 
neglected them altogether. Let it be a principle 
with you from which nothing shall lead you to 
depart, that you will leave nothing that you 
undertake till it is thoroughly accomplished. If 
you are a student, never lay aside your book, till 
you fully comprehend your lesson : whatever 



124 DILIGENCE, 

mysteries there may be before you in the book 
that yon are studying, let there be none in the 
portion of it that you have passed over. If you 
are a mechanic, or a merchant, or a lawyer, or a 
physician, or any thing else, rest not till you have 
done the very best that you are capable of doing 
in the station which you occupy. If you early 
form the habit of doing every thing well, the 
consequence will be that you will soon do every 
thing with pleasure to yourself, and with satisfac- 
tion to others. 

But while the general course of your efforts is 
indicated by the nature of the employment to 
which you devote yourself, — in other words, 
while it is to be expected that you labour chiefly 
in some one particular direction, you are to beware 
that you do not neglect other collateral duties of 
equal or even greater importance. If there is 
danger that you may not engage with sufficient 
earnestness in the duties of your worldly vocation, 
there is danger, on the other hand, that you may 
be so intensely occupied by them, that they will 
lead you to forget that you have any thing else to 
do in the world than make money, or hunt after 
fame. You have various duties to perform towards 



DILIGENCE. 125 

your fellow men from which nothing can absolve 
you- — duties to your family, .your friends, the 
community in which you live. You have also 
duties that you owe more immediately to yourself 
and to God — such as reading the scriptures, de- 
vout meditation, private devotion, every thing 
that enters into the cultivation of personal piety. 
You must never pursue any worldly vocation so 
eagerly that you shall not give yourself time to 
fulfil all these various classes of duties with rigid- 
fidelity. That kind of diligence which looks with 
a cold eye on our obligations to God, and which 
exhausts itself in efforts to gain the world — no 
matter in what form — poisons the comfort, mars 
the character, ruins the soul. 

You will not understand me as intimating any 
disapprobation of the occasional mingling of young 
men in the lighter scenes of life. It is quite 
necessary to their highest usefulness that they 
should sometimes relax from severer duties, and 
nothing is more fitting for them than the inter- 
change of kind feelings with each other and with 
their friends. This, while it constitutes the 
appropriate culture of their social nature, and 
thus subserves some of the great ends of human 



126 DILIGENCE. 

existence, is adapted to answer the purpose of all 
requisite cessation from labour, and to brighten up 
the faculties for the graver pursuits of life. 

I ought here, however, to remark, that the pur- 
poses of relaxation may be accomplished, to a 
great extent, by a course of useful reading. This, 
of course, is not of itself sufficient, because it 
makes no provision for bodily exercise : still it 
may frequently be resorted to with good effect ; 
' and every prudent young man will take care that 
it constitutes a part of the economy of life. 
Comparatively few are professionally devoted to 
pursuits that are in themselves specially adapted 
to the culture of the mind ; but with almost any 
worldly vocation there may be connected a habit 
of useful reading, that shall keep the faculties in 
healthful exercise, and in a constant course of 
improvement 

I hardly need say that it is of the greatest 
importance to your fulfilling with diligence your 
various duties, that you should use all requisite 
means for the preservation of your health ; for 
you may rest assured that, if your health faiis, 
your power of exertion fails with it ; and health 
is not so easy a thing to be retained, that you can 



DILIGENCE. 127 

hope to remain in the possession of it without 
greci care and vigilance. With a view to this, 
avoid ail habits of excess. Be careful particularly 
in respect to food, and rest, and exercise : have 
fixed rules, so far as you can, in regard to each, 
and let nothing but invincible necessity lead you 
to depart from them. If your occupation subjects 
you to a sedentary habit — for instance, if it be 
that of a student, there is additional reason why 
you should give heed to these directions ; for 
nothing but a scrupulous observance of them 
will counteract the tendencies to disease incident 
to such a vocation. I could refer you to cases 
without number in which the noblest minds have 
been prostrated and ruined by a neglect of those 
wholesome rules which Providence has prescribed 
for the regulation of our physical nature. 

It has doubtless sometimes occurred to you, as 
a matter of surprise, that some persons who seem 
to be always busy, and when applied to for any 
service, never have a moment of leisure to give 
to it, after all, accomplish very little. If you 
scrutinize the case, you will almost always find 
that the chief difficulty lies in the want of method. 
These persons are willing enough to labour; 



128 DILIGENCE. 

but they have never trained themselves to labour 
systematically. They take every thing at random, 
and of course at disadvantage. Nothing is done 
in its appropriate place — nothing at the proper 
time ; and hence that which is done, is often to 
very little purpose. You may be the busiest man 
in the community, and your efforts may generally 
be well directed ; and yet, without system, you 
would hardly be missed, if you should be removed 
from the world. Endeavour then always to work 
by rule. Let your duties succeed each other so 
as to produce no confusion — so that you shall 
never find yourself lost in the midst of them. Let 
your diligence be systematic as well as earnest 
and persevering, and it cannot fail to be both 
effective and delightful. 



ECONOMY. 129 



LETTER X 



ECONOMY. 



There is at least one incident recorded in the 
life of Joseph, that strikingly illustrates his fore- 
sight and sagacity in respect to the management 
of his worldly concerns. Immediately after his 
appointment to the office of governour of the land 
of Egypt, he went forth, in anticipation of the 
famine which had been divinely revealed to him 
as about to come upon the land, and gathered up 
all the food of the plenteous seven years which 
were then passing, and deposited it in the various 
cities, that it might be ready against the time of 
need. That anticipated period quickly came ; 
and the consequence was that, while there was a 
universal famine prevailing, to use the language 
of the narrative, " in all lands," there was plenty 
of bread throughout the land of Egypt. It was 
a noble example for a ruler ; and it conveys ^ 



130 ECONOMY. 

lesson of economy, which is especially worthy 
the attention of every young man. 

But, before I attempt to enforce this lesson, I 
must say a word to guard you against confounding 
this virtue (for such the genuine quality really is,) 
with another quality which is often mistaken for 
it — viz: meanness in pecuniary transactions 
This mistake has been made by those who have 
departed from true economy, on the right hand 
and on the left. There are some who actually 
exemplify the attribute of meanness, who contrive 
to protect themselves from self reproach by the 
reflection that they are only observing the rules of 
economy, and that economy is a noble virtue ; 
while there are others who verge quite to the 
opposite extreme, and, in the exercise of a prodigal 
spirit, stigmatize as mean what is really nothing 
more than a becoming frugality. But names, 
after all, however much men may be deceived by 
them, do not affect things; — -there is such a thing 
as economy, and there is such a thing as meanness ; 
and they are as really distinct from each other, as 
any good quality and any bad quality that you 
can name. 

The spirit which I am reprobating as being 



ECONOMY. 131 

sometimes confounded with economy, most fre- 
quently discovers itself in little things; and it 
never fails to impart a corresponding littleness to 
the entire character. It does not necessarily 
imply any intention to be dishonest, though it 
often runs to such a length that those who witness 
its operations, will wonder how they are to be 
reconciled with strict integrity. I have known 
some men of excellent talents, and otherwise of 
excellent character, who have well nigh ruined 
themselves with this spirit of pseudo-economy. 
Nay, I have known men of great conscientious- 
ness, and I have no doubt of sincere piety, who 
withal were in the habit of contributing largely to 
the great objects of Christian benevolence, who 
yet, from education or habit, were so insufferably 
mean, that a liberal mind could scarcely think of 
them with patience. The secret of this no doubt 
generally is, that, with perhaps a naturally money- 
loving spirit, they have been early constrained 
to the greatest economy in order to secure an 
education or raise themselves in life ; and, as a 
consequence, they have acquired a sort of penu- 
rious and miserly habit, which, though it may 
yield to the triumph of conscience and principle 



132 ECONOMY. 

in greater matters, shows itself unconquered in 
respect to the less. I remember to have heard of 
a New England governour, who, many years ago, 
was crossing a ferry on his way to the seat of 
government, and, on being landed, asked the 
ferryman what he had to pay. The ferryman, 
presuming that it would be safe to trust to the 
honour and self respect of so distinguished a 
personage, replied, " What you please, sir ;" 
expecting that he should receive at least double 
the usual fee. The governour handed him out a 
piece of money which w T as only half the fee to 
which he was legally entitled, and remarked that 
u he would not stand for change !" It is, to say 
the least, an awkward thing for a governour to sell 
his dignity for a New-York sixpence. 
• Against this spirit I entreat you, as you value 
your standing and influence in society, to be oh 
your guard. The reputation of being poor never 
need terrify you ; for poverty in itself is not 
dishonourable ; — but to be regarded, and deserv- 
edly regarded, mean, were an evil to which no 
earthly advantage should be considered an adequate 
offset. Be careful that you do not put your 
reputation at hazard in this way, even by equivocal 



ECONOMY. 133 

acts. If your circumstances will not permit you 
to appear generous, by meeting claims that are 
made upon you, and that you might be expected 
promptly to answer, let an honest statement of 
your circumstances prevent all misapprehension of 
your motives. If the stigma of meanness is once 
fastened upon you, there is great reason to fear 
that, in spite of all you can do, it will remain 
upon you for life ; and even if you should attempt 
to retrieve your character by subsequent acts of 
generosity, you need not wonder if it should be 
said that this is all a matter of calculation and 
effort, and that you have just as much the heart 
of a miser or a niggard as ever. 

Having said thus much to guard you against a 
perversion of the quality which I would recom- 
mend, I am now prepared to urge upon your con- 
sideration the virtue itself — in other words, to 
illustrate the importance of strict economy in your 
pecuniary concerns. 

It is important that you should practise economy 
in the management of your business. Suppose 
you are devoted to mercantile pursuits — without 
that rigid economy which is the result of much 
forethought and calculation, you can have no 



134 ECONOMY. 

reasonable hope of success ; for, though you may 
have ever so large a capital to trade upon, you 
will find that it will not be proof against a 
negligent and random sort of management. If 
you are careless in your purchases, and careless 
in your sales, and careless in your charges, you 
will inevitably reap the fruit of your carelessness 
in the gradual diminution, and, at no distant 
period, the complete wreck of your property. If 
you will be a successful merchant, you must 
husband your means with the utmost care, and 
ever be on the alert to avert threatening losses, 
and to avail yourself of every fair und honourable 
advantage. And so in regard to every other occu- 
pation — if you are a mechanic, or a physician, or 
a lawyer, you ought to realize the legitimate 
benefits of your profession ; and this you can never 
do without adhering to strict economy. 

Nor is there less need of economy in regard to 
your personal expenses ; in which I include dress, 
furniture, equipage — every thing that enters into 
one's mode of living. And here allow me to 
make a remark to guard you against what I am 
constrained to consider one of the uitraisms of the 
day: — viz. that the same general style of living 



ECONOMY. 135 

should be observed by all without reference to 
the circumstances in which Providence has placed 
them ; and that those who have large estates, 
whether by inheritance or by their own acquisi- 
tion, have no right to appropriate any part of 
their wealth for their own personal gratification, 
above what is necessary to their bare subsistence 
in the plainest manner. Now, I do not believe a 
word of this. It is evidently the design of Provi- 
dence that there should be distinctions in society ; 
these distinctions are clearly recognized in scrip- 
ture ; and though they are capable of being 
greatly perverted and abused, yet, in themselves, 
they are not sinful — they are even necessary to 
the accomplishment of the greatest good, and the 
enjoyment of the highest happiness. I say then, 
that this levelling system which would tear up all 
the carpets from our floors, and substitute for 
elegant furniture the plainest utensils, and carry 
us far back toward the ages of barbarism, however 
its advocates may urge it under the plea of 
benevolence or even piety, receives no counte- 
nance either from the word or the Providence of 
God. If you are in affluent circumstances, you 
have a right to live more expensively than if you 



186 ECONOMY. 

were in indigence ; and if you gather around you 
some of the luxuries and elegances of life, I do 
not believe that you are chargeable with wrong 
But, after all. the obligations of economy rest on 
you. just as truly as if you were poor. You are 
bound to take heed that your property does not 
go needlessly to waste : and that you do not 
indulge your elegant tastes at the expense of the 
claims of either justice or charity, That is cer- 
tainly a criminal extravagance that appropriates 
great possessions to mere purposes of worldly 
splendour, and turns a deaf ear to the imploring 
voice of human want. 

But it is the few only who are rich : the great 
mass are in circumstances of mediocrity or com- 
parative indigence : and these should practise a 
degree of economy corresponding to the condition 
in which Providence has placed them. They 
should be particularly careful that their expenses 
are not greater than are justified by their income ; 
and if there should be a necessity to curtail them, 
they should never hesitate from an apprehension 
of awakening suspicion in regard to their worldly 
circumstances. There are some young men, 
whom every body knows to be poor, who yet 



ECONOMY. 137 

have a perfect passion to surround themselves 
with the insignia of opulence. They dress in an 
extravagant style, and ride in an expensive 
carriage, and, on all public occasions particularly, 
appear unusually flush of their money, with the 
idea of hiding from the world their poverty, or 
possibly of making the appearance of wealth a 
bait to some young girl who happens to possess 
the reality. But such experiments only demon- 
strate the folly of those who make them. Let a 
young man who is poor thus try to appear 
wealthy, or let one only get the reputation of 
living in a style which his income does not 
warrant, and, from that hour, there will come a 
shade over his character : he will be looked upon, 
at least, with suspicion, if he is not set down as 
absolutely untrustworthy. 

There are two powerful reasons suggested by 
the history of Joseph, why every young man 
should cultivate the virtue which I am recom- 
mending. The first is connected with a suitable 
providence in regard to the future. Joseph, in 
^e prospect of the years of famine, made pro- 
vision for them during the years of p^nty ; and 
it was this only that enabled him t(? m^e* &£ 

9* 



138 ECONOMY. 

demands of his people for bread. He indeed was 
apprized of the approaching dearth, by divine 
intimation : but you are left to the calculations of 
an unassisted foresight. This much, however, 
you know — that your lot is cast in a world of 
vicissitude ; that riches often take to themselves 
wings and fly away : and that in the changes of 
business and the chances of adventure, even the 
richest man in the community has no security 
that he may not lose every thing. Here then is 
a reason why you should look to what you possess 
with the strictest care ; why you should not. from 
inconsideration or neglect, run the chance of 
losing it. You imagine perhaps that you have 
no particular need of economy, as you have 
enough to live upon now. and you do not think 
it well to be anxious for the future. Certainly 
you should not indulge an undue solicitude ; but 
there is a degree of forethought which you are 
bound to take and without which your prospect 
is shrouded in gloom. If you have enough, and 
only enough to support you now. what will you 
do in the time of sickness, when you will be 
unable to labour : — what, in the winter season of 
old age, if you should be spared to that period, — 



ECONOMY. 139 

when the grasshopper shall be a burden, and the 
almond tree flourish ? Surely, you will not wish 
then to be dependant on the charity of the world. 
Cultivate economy then now, as the preventive of 
such a calamity ; and, if no such exigency should 
arise, you need not fear but that your earnings 
may still be appropriated to bless and comfort 
your fellow creatures. 

And this leads me to advert to the other reason 
which Joseph's experience suggests for your cul- 
tivating this habit — I mean the ability which it 
will secure to you of administering to the wants 
of others — of helping forward the great cause of 
Christian charity. Though it does not appear that 
Joseph, when he evinced such provident regard 
for the future, by laying up corn in store-houses, 
had any intimation that he would ever have an 
opportunity of relieving the wants of his own 
family, yet so it turned out : when they might 
otherwise have perished from the famine, they 
were supplied, through his provident bounty, w T ith 
every comfort that they could desire; and espe- 
cially he had the privilege of ministering to the 
necessities of his aged father, from whom he had 
suffered a long and cruel exile. Is it not worth 



140 ECONOMY. 

while to practise economy, even in the possibility 
of such a result? Perhaps, by this means, you 
may be enabled to invite your parents, in the 
decline of life, to come and make their residence 
by the side of you, and to find their wants all 
supplied from your filial bounty ; or else, if you 
are separated from them, you may gladden their 
hearts by sending them the requisite supplies — 
the fruit of your habitual economy. Or else, like 
Joseph, you may have brothers who are in need — 
possibly brothers w T ho, by some visitation of Pro- 
vidence, are rendered unab]e to help themselves — 
what a comfort would it be to you to be able to 
stretch out the hand of charity towards them, and 
*o offer them perhaps a quiet home and a comfort- 
able support ! But even if you should have no 
relatives to require your assistance, you live in a 
world that is full of the suffering poor ; in a world 
where the blessings of Christianity are yet but 
partially diffused ; in a world where money — 
worthless as we sometimes account it — will avail 
to a thousand purposes of human happiness and 
improvement. Do you not aspire to the privilege 
of being a benefactor to your fellow creatures? 
Is there not a chord strung in your heart, that 



DIGNITY. 141 

vibrates gratefully to the thought that your earn- 
ings may tell on the best interests of many whom 
you will never see on earth — that the blessing of 
some who are ready to perish may come upon 
you ? Then, I say, yet once more, practise the 
virtue of economy. Live frugally that you may 
live not for yourself alone ; that if you do not 
leave behind you wealth to be distributed for the 
benefit of others, you may at least leave behind 
you an example which it will be for the interest 
of others to imitate. 



LETTER XL 



DIGNITY, 



There are two senses in which the word dignity 
in relation to man may be considered. It may 
have respect either to the character or the man- 
ners — to the inward feeling or the external 
conduct. An individual may possess dignity of 
character — in other words, true nobleness of 



142 DIGNITY. 

mind — and yet, owing to some defect either of 
constitution or of education, there may be but a 
very imperfect external development of it; though, 
in most cases, there is no defect which may not be 
remedied by suitable culture. And on the other 
hand, it is quite possible that an individual may 
exhibit much of the appearance of dignity, 
without any of those feelings with which the 
genuine quality is identified — his manners may 
be characterized by the absence of every thing 
light and frivolous, by a winning gracefulness, and 
apparently by a suitable regard to the company in 
which he mingles ; and yet, after all, this may be 
the result of calculation and nothing else — in 
other words, it may be a matter of deliberate and 
studied artifice. The dignity which I would 
recommend, and of which Joseph was an illustrious 
example, is at once the dignity of principle, of 
feeling, and of action. In a word, it is an all 
pervading attribute of the man. 

There is not a single incident in Joseph's 
history, that even seems to involve the least 
departure from true dignity — on the contrary, 
this beautiful quality was reflected in every more 
important action of his life. You never find him 



DIGNITY. 143 

forgetting the peculiar circumstances in which he 
was placed, or the relations which he sustained to 
those around him ; but, on all occasions, he is 
influenced by the most delicate sense of propriety, 
and seems always instinctively to do the very thing 
which the most mature consideration would have 
prompted. Whether he was a slave or a governour, 
whether in the palace or in the prison, there w r as a 
discreet and thoughtful manner — a delightful 
appropriateness in all his conduct, that revealed 
the inward workings of a great and noble spirit. 

Taking for granted that true dignity has its 
foundation in virtuous dispositions, and is itself 
either the principle or the expression of a lofty 
form of virtue, let me call your attention briefly 
to some of its more prominent ingredients — to 
some of those qualities, both as it respects the 
inner and the outer man, which you must diligently 
cultivate, if you would furnish an example of this 
noble characteristic. 

I would say then, in the first place, the utmost 
purity — purity of conduct, of conversation, of 
thought and feeling — is essential to true dignity, 
I have had occasion to remark, in a preceding 
letter, that there is nothing so degrading to om 



144 DIGNITY. 

nature — nothing that approaches so nearly to the 
putting off of the man and the putting on of the 
brute, as the habit of excessive sensual indulgence. 
No matter what else an individual may be, if he 
surrenders himself to the tyranny of his bodily 
appetites, he is, in the worst sense, a slave — he 
may indeed play the tyrant toward others, but it 
is impossible that he should hold them in so 
degrading a bondage as that of which he is himself 
the subject. It is possible indeed, that one may 
be a sensualist in thought and feeling, and, to the 
eye of God, may appear in all the guilt and 
pollution that belongs to such a character, and 
yet, by the exercise of great self restraint, may 
pass with the world for a man of a clean heart ; 
but, in all ordinary cases, the impure fountain in 
the soul will send forth streams not less visible and 
palpable than loathsome and contaminating. Let 
a man be known to belong to this class, and he 
can never pass, even with dissolute men them- 
selves, for a person of true dignity. He may 
possess every external attraction, he may be at 
home in the most polished circles, he may be a 
thoroughly educated and accomplished man, — 
and yet, if he is understood to be a libertine, his 



DIGNITY. 145 

very name is a synonyme for a debasing loath- 
someness. 

Let me entreat you then, my young friends, 
as you would possess not only the reputation of 
being dignified, but the substantial quality also, 
to exercise the utmost self control in regard to 
the bodily appetites. And to this end, endeavour, 
so far as possible, to keep out of the reach of 
temptation. Forbid your imagination to wander 
amidst objects or scenes of a polluting character ; 
and, if you find it inclined to these unhallowed 
excursions, let the energy of your whole soul be 
put in requisition to restrain it. Let no corrupt 
communication proceed out of your mouth : for 
if an evil heart is the natural fountain of vulgar 
and licentious conversation, such conversation in 
turn renders the heart more prolific of evil. I 
might urge you to the cultivation of this inward 
purity from other considerations; particularly as 
it identifies itself with your happiness both in this 
world and the next ; but this and other views of 
the subject, I must be contented to leave to your 
own private reflection. 

Another leading element of a dignified character 
is discretion — by which I intend an accurate 
10 



146 DIGNITY. 

discernment united with a due degree of caution. 
I am well aware that there is a great diversity in 
the original constitutions of men in this respect ; — 
that, while some are naturally impetuous and, in 
a great measure, thoughtless of consequences, 
others are naturally considerate, and rarely say or 
do an important thing which is not the result of 
previous reflection. But, notwithstanding this ori- 
ginal difference, there is no doubt that discretion, 
like any other good quality, is susceptible of being 
cultivated ; and no one is excusable in the eye 
either of God or man — let his constitutional ten- 
dencies be what they may — who fails to possess it. 
Without it, an individual will be continually 
saying and doing unfit things ; and though many 
of his errours may be the result of ignorance, yet, 
as that ignorance results from the want of due 
reflection and attention, it will not, and ought not 
to be admitted as an apology. In the intercourse 
of society, how often are the feelings of individuals 
severely tried, and a whole circle perhaps thrown 
into the greatest embarrassment, by a single remark 
which the least particle of discretion would have 
prevented ; while the person uttering the remark 
thereby renders his presence unwelcome, and 



DIGNITY. 147 

perhaps creates a painful association in the minds 
of those who hear it, that will never be removed. 
No person with this kind of spirit ever possessed 
true dignity of manners. I do not say that some- 
thing like this may not and does not often exist 
in connection with general good intentions — if 
you please, with the spirit of benevolence and 
devotion ; but you may rest assured that. 
wherever it exists, it mars the character, and 
interferes with the legitimate influence of any 
good qualities with which it happens to be 
associated. 

Simplicity and modesty, in opposition to all 
affected and consequential airs, belong also to 
true dignity. And yet there are young men not 
a few, who suppose themselves dignified in the 
view of the world, just in proportion to the 
number of these airs which they are able to 
assume. You converse with them, and you see 
that their conversation, instead of being free and 
natural, is characterized by unceasing effort — 
effort to say things which the circumstances 
neither suggest nor warrant, but which are 
supposed to illustrate their own fancied superi- 
ority. Not unfrequently the same feeling is 



148 DIGNITY. 

betrayed in the air with which they walk the 
streets, and especially with which they enter any 
publick place of resort, where they suppose the 
eyes of the multitude are turned upon them. 
You will never find young men of this character 
in the company of their superiors — they may 
indeed be surrounded by men venerable for their 
age and standing in society — men who may have 
a character for greatness as well as goodness that 
reaches beyond their own country ; and yet these 
striplings, nothing daunted by such company, 
will talk on with oracular confidence, and with a 
pertness that knows not how to blush. If you 
will cultivate true dignity, you must have no 
communion with an assuming or arrogant spirit. 
I would not, by any means, have you yield to an 
unbecoming diffidence, which would render you 
at once awkward and uncomfortable, and would 
also be inconsistent with suitable self-respect 
nevertheless, whatever your talents or acquire- 
ments may be, I w r ouid have you bear in mind 
that you are a young man, and as such, are bound 
to show a modest deference toward your superiors 
in age, especially if, as is very likely to be the 
case, they are also your superiors in wisdom. In 



DIGNITY. 149 

the expression of your opinion, always show a 
becoming respect towards those who differ from 
you j and, however freely you may give reasons 
to justify it, let there be nothing in your manner 
that shall seem to claim for yourself the attribute 
of infallibility. 

Closely allied to the qualities of which I have 
just spoken is courtesy — or general politeness 
connected with kindness. The importance of this, 
both to one's comfort and usefulness, is generally 
but very inadequately estimated ; and for want of 
duly cultivating it, many persons of great minds 
and good hearts, go through life without ever 
passing for any thing more than ordinary men. 

- Genuine courtesy will throw an atmosphere 

around you which will render it delightful to be 

in your company. It will not lead you to burden 

•• your friends with forced expressions of kindness, 

«-; or to urge upon them hospitalities which you know 
they cannot accept, or to give them your time 
when it is demanded by urgent and indispensable 
duties. It will not lead you to treat every body 
with the same degree of confidence and warmth, 
leaving each one to suppose, provided he can be 
duped into it, that he is your peculiar favourite, 



150 DIGNITY. 

and that j if you should ever have high places at 
your disposal, he should occupy the very highest. 
No, this neither constitutes true courtesy, nor is 
consistent with it. But it does, belong to this 
quality, to dictate a considerate regard to the 
character and feelings of all with whom you 
mingle. It will prompt you to acts of civility 
and respect, even where you are unable to confer 
substantial favours; and thus will impress itself 
most gratefully and indelibly on the memories 
of those toward whom it is exercised. I could 
almost say that I had rather have a request 
refused by some men than to have it granted by 
others ; for, while one would satisfy me of his 
earnest desire to meet my wishes, and of his 
sincere regret that he was unable to do it, and 
would, by his whole manner, leave upon my 
mind an impression of his good will and gene- 
rosity, another would indeed give me what I 
asked, but would do it in such an ungracious way, 
and perhaps with so much of the spirit of fault 
finding, that I should go away thinking little of 
the accommodation which I had received, in 
comparison with the uncomfortable and freezing 
interview with which it had been connected. 



DIGNITY. 151 

If you will cultivate true courtesy, you must 
cultivate true benevolence ; for without benevo- 
lent feelings, there is really no foundation for 
genuine politeness. You must acquire a suitable 
degree of self command in order to save yourself 
from awkward embarrassment. And you must 
have that knowledge of the forms of society 
which shall make you at home in the various 
circles into which you may be cast. Let me say, 
you may derive great advantage in this respect, 
from contemplating the characters of those who 
have been eminent for this quality — of such men, 
for instance, as Wilberforce and Thornton, and 1 
will venture to add, as one of the finest models, 
that I have ever met with — our own lamented 
Stephen Van Rensselaer. By holding to your 
mind the record of what they were, you will 
insensibly imbibe the same spirit which animated 
them, and, under its influence, will exhibit some- 
what of a corresponding deportment. Nay, think 
it not strange that I recommend to your special 
study and imitation in this respect, the example 
of the Saviour of the world ; for I need not say 
that he was a perfect model of propriety in every 
relation. 



152 DIGNITY. 

Moreover, you can never possess true dignity,' 
without decision of character. You may indeed 
possess many amiable and winning qualities 
without it — you may have the amiableness that 
conciliates, and the gracefulness that fascinates, 
and you may have fine intellectual powers that 
will render it an object with many to seek your 
company ; and yet, after all, if you lack firmness 
of purpose — if you are at the mercy of every 
breath of influence that may happen to fall upon 
you, you lack one of the most essential elements 
of true dignity. A vacillating character can never 
command respect where once it has come to be 
understood. Whatever good qualities there may 
be connected with it, the simple fact that you 
know not where to find the individual, and that 
his opinion on any subject one month is no indica- 
tion what it may be the next, throws around him 
an air of insignificance which no redeeming traits 
will enable you to forget. I am aware that firm- 
ness is sometimes mistaken for obstinacy, and 
obstinacy for firmness ; but the difference is that 
the one yields to the power of evidence — the 
other is unyielding in spite of evidence. If a 
fickle mind marks one as the subject of weakness, 



DIGNITY. 153 

an obstinate mind is no less indicative of ignorance, 
passion, or prejudice. Cultivate firmness ; but be- 
ware both of fickleness and obstinacy. 

If I were to counsel you, in a single word, in 
respect to the best means of attaining that dignity 
of character which has been the subject of this 
letter, I should say — endeavour first to form a 
proper estimate of your relations and circum- 
stances, and then let your conduct be strictly 
conformed to this estimate. Treat every body 
around you just in the manner in which the relation 
you sustain to them requires. Your superiors in 
age or standing, always treat with deferential 
respect. In your intercourse with your equals, 
be careful that your familiarity never degenerates 
into a violation of the proprieties of life. Towards 
those whom Providence has placed below you, 
always be civil and obliging, and do not attempt 
unduly to magnify the difference that separates 
you from them. Remember that true dignity is 
independent of the distinctions of life — that you 
may possess your millions and yet be absolutely 
destitute of it — that you may be in absolute 
poverty, and yet be a noble example of it. 



154 SYMPATHY. 



LETTER XII. 



SYMPATHY. 



The whole tenour of the history of Joseph shows 
that he had a warm and generous heart ; that he 
was at the greatest remove from a selfish spirit ; 
thus his sensibilities could never slumber, when 
any of the various forms of human wo were passing 
under his eye. But there is one incident in 
particular, to which I design chiefly to refer as an 
illustration of this feature of his character — I 
mean the interest which he manifested in behalf 
of his fellow prisoners, when they were perplexed 
from not being able to understand their own 
dreams. 

The butler and the baker each had a dream, 
which they suspected was of ominous import; 
and when Joseph, who had, by that time, been 
made a sort of overseer of his fellow prisoners, 
came in in the morning to inspect his charge, he 
found these two men looking very sorrowful, as 



SYMPATHY. 155 

if they were apprehending some great calamity. 
On inquiring concerning the cause of their 
dejection, he was informed that each of them 
had had a mysterious dream which they were 
unable to interpret ; upon which, Jose-ph, having 
recognized the fact that " all interpretations 
belong to God," requested them, each to give 
a particular relation of his dream. This being 
done, he proceeded at once to act as interpreter ; 
and though the interpretation in the two cases 
was widely different, — that in relation to the 
butler pointing to a speedy restoration to his 
office, and that concerning the baker to his being 
hung up on a tree — yet it was sympathy in 
Joseph that led him to undertake the interpreta- 
tion ; and however painful the result was in 
respect to the latter, it was an act of kindness in 
him to reveal to the poor fellow his fate, that he 
might be induced to make good use of the brief 
period he had to live. Herein, my young friends, 
is Joseph an example to you ; and happy shall I 
be, if any thing that I can say shall encourage or 
assist you to the cultivation of the same praise- 
worthy spirit. 

There is a sort of spurious sensibility, which 



156 SYMPATHY.. 

Christianity, benevolence, sincerity, all disown, 
I mean that sensibility which can come bravely 
into exercise at the tale of imaginary suffering ; 
which can weep away a whole evening over a 
play, or a whole week over a novel ; but has no 
tears to shed, and no relief to offer, for objects 
of real distress. This miserable sentimentality, 
(for of sensibility it does not deserve the name) 
instead of being an honour, is a disgrace, to 
human nature : and it finds its reward in dream- 
ing about the exquisiteness and luxury of its own 
exercises. It is the creature of infidel philosophy. 
Its field is an imaginary world. It never blesses 
man — it never pleases God. 

Very unlike this was the feeling which Joseph 
manifested in the case to which I have adverted. 
It was not an indolent and selfish feeling that was 
indulged merely for its own sake, but a generous 
and practical feeling that wakened into exercise 
the active powers, and prompted to an effort for 
the relief of suffering. Nor was there any parade 
about Joseph's sympathy. It does not appear that 
he spent a moment in expressing his commisera- 
tion for their lot 5 though, if he had not been 
deeply affected by it, he never would have thus 



SYMPATHY. 15? 

enlisted in their behalf; — but he went directly 
to the work of interpreting their dreams; and 
thus the sympathy which he felt for them turned 
to a good account. It was sympathy ripening into 
charity — it was feeling passing into action. 

There is a chord strung in the human heart 
that naturally vibrates to the notes of sorrow ; 
though it must be acknowledged that all are not 
constituted alike in this respect, and that the 
original principle is capable of being weakened 
or strengthened, of receiving a right or wrong 
direction, according to the influences to which it 
is subjected. Your duty is to cherish this princi- 
ple, and bring it into exercise, under the guiding, 
purifying, elevating influences of Christianity. 
You are to keep alive that feeling for another's 
wo, that shall lead you, not indeed without 
suitable discrimination — for indiscriminate sym- 
pathy, or rather charity, often fails of its object — 
but according to the dictates of an enlightened 
judgment, to administer such relief as may be in 
your power. 

In such a world as this, you can never be at a 
loss where to look for objects that deserve your 
sympathy. They are all around you, and meet 



158 SYMPATHY. 

you at every turn of life. And they live in 
distant regions which your vision will never 
penetrate. But even these are legitimate objects 
of your sympathy ; for the story of their degra- 
dation and wretchedness has reached you ; and 
if the mind comprehends, it is not necessary that 
the eye should see, in order that the heart may 
feel. And it is a delightful feature in the aspects 
of Providence, that there is no part of the world 
so dark or so distant, but that you may gain 
access to it, at least by your charities and prayers. 
The inhabitant of Hindostan or . California may 
receive blessings, which, but for your sympathy, 
never would have reached him, and which may 
make him rich to all eternity. But let us traverse 
together this wide field on which your sympathies 
may legitimately operate ; and let me point out 
to you a few of the particular cases from which 
you may not — if you have the right spirit — will 
not, turn away. 

The first, and perhaps the most common, case 
that presents itself, is that of bereavement. 
Death is doing his work, continually, every 
where. Nothing is more common than for the 
families in which you are most intimate, to be 



SYMPATHY. 159 

thrown into the depths of affliction by the sudden 
removal to the grave of some one of their number. 
Stay not needlessly away from such a dwelling ; 
for you may rest assured that the language of 
condolence falls sweetly upon the mourner's ear. 
Your friends will love to hear you speak of their 
departed friend ; and especially if you go in the 
spirit of a Christian, you will carry a balm to 
their wounded hearts. There is indeed great 
delicacy to be observed in regard to the sorrows 
of others — especially that overwhelming flood of 
grief that follows a sudden bereavement; and 
there may be circumstances in which it is fitting 
that you should refrain from visiting them, at 
least till the first gush of agonized feeling is past ; 
but as soon as propriety will admit, you should 
repair to their dwellings as a sympathizing friend. 
And where this is not practicable, by reason of 
distance or any other unfavourable circumstance, 
you may often advantageously express your sym- 
pathy by writing a letter ; for while it will be a 
comfort to your afflicted friends to know that you 
are thinking of them in their sorrow, you may be 
able to connect with your expressions of condo- 
lence some good and fitting counsels, that shall 



160 SYMPATHY. 

aid to a right improvement of their trials. And 
let me say that this last office is one that is 
peculiarly needful to be discharged towards a 
person in deep affliction ; for there is always 
danger that, by brooding incessantly over his loss, 
his mind may acquire that morbid habit, of which 
a complaining spirit is the leading element, and 
from which the transition will be to a deeper 
neglect of the most important interests. 

Sickness is another form of trouble that may 
well call forth your sympathy— sickness under 
any circumstances, but more especially, when it 
is found in connection with poverty. Such scenes 
as this, you must go out of the world ; if you will 
avoid; and if your residence happens to be in a 
large city, a little familiarity, especially with the 
outskirts and the obscurer parts of the city, will 
reveal to you scenes of this description more 
numerous and more distressing, than you had 
perhaps ever imagined. Sickness alone is bad 
enough — sickness, when surrounded with all the 
alleviations and appliances that wealth and friend- 
ship can furnish, is not an easy thing to be borne, 
as every one who has had experience will testify. 
But when poverty comes to be mingled in the 



SYMPATHY. 161 

same cup, and the patient has no home but a 
hovel, and no bed but a pallet of straw, and no 
accommodations of any kind but such as acci- 
dental charity may have brought to him — be 
assured that sickness in these circumstances 
becomes quite another thing ; and sympathy for 
such a sufferer, it would seem the most insensible 
heart could not suppress. I counsel you, instead 
of avoiding such scenes, because they are painful 
or disgusting, to turn in at such a dwelling as 
often as your circumstances will permit. Be not 
afraid to stand by the bed side of the sick and the 
dying, though every thing may tell of the most 
squalid poverty and the deepest degradation. 
Stand there, if it may not be as a comforter to 
the body, at least as a guide and counsellor to 
the spirit. Bring remedies and comforts to the 
sick man, if you can ; and if God raises him up, 
he will bless you for your generous remembrance 
of him in the time of his need ; and if he have 
been hitherto a neglecter of his immortal interests, 
you will be able the more easily to gain his ear 
in speaking to him concerning them. Or if he 
should die, who can tell but that what you say to 

him on his death bed, may be the means, by God's 
10* 



162 SYMPATHY. 

blessing, of fitting him for Heaven — but that your 
kind and christian counsels to his family, together 
with your earnest prayers in their behalf, may 
lead them to seek and find the consolations of the 
gospel % 

There are many cases of spiritual distress also 
that invite your sympathy. The careless world, 
I know, make but little account of these cases ; 
and yet they who have had experience know that 
there is no suffering on earth so bitter as that 
which they involve. The sinner awakened from 
his dreams of carelessness to a sense of his rela- 
tions to God as his Lawgiver and Judge, is not 
unfrequently, for a long time, subject to the most 
tormenting reflections; the remembrance of his 
sins, of which he once thought nothing, haunts 
him by day and by night; remorse becomes a 
settled resident in his bosom ; and sometimes 
despair — absolute despair, throws her deep 
shadows around him. And then again, there are 
cases in which professing Christians, owing 
perhaps to some delinquency or some infirmity, 
come to believe that theirs has been a spurious 
religious experience ; and, in the strength of this 
conviction, they are for a long time buried in 



SYMPATHY. 163 

spiritual gloom. If you are not a true Christian 
yourself, such cases as these will be little likely 
to awaken your sympathy, because the distress 
which belongs to them not only lies without the 
circle of your experience, but cannot be adequately 
appreciated by you; but if you have been the 
subject of a spiritual renovation, you cannot be 
brought in contact with persons in these circum- 
stances without feeling for them deeply ; and 
your sympathy will naturally discover itself in an 
effort for their relief. You will direct them to 
the fountain of grace and comfort that is set open 
in the gospel. You will set forth distinctly and 
fully the terms on which the blessings of salva- 
tion are offered. You will endeavour to correct 
mistakes, to solve difficulties, to do every thing 
that you can, to bring the darkened mind, writing 
bitter things against itself, in contact with the 
glorious promises. And you have every reason 
to hope that your sympathy thus expressed in a 
well-directed labour of love, will avail even to the 
most important purposes — to bring the awakened 
sinner to the cross of Christ, and lead the despond- 
ing Christian to rejoice again in the evidence of 
the divine favour. 



164 SYMPATHY. 

There is, moreover, a wide field for your sympa- 
thy in the condition of the careless and ungodly 
world — of the multitude around you, some of 
whom are sunk in ignorance and vice — the 
slaves of sensuality and the dupes of a false 
religion, and others are decent respecters of 
Christian institutions, but neglecters of the great 
salvation. And then there are the hundreds of 
millions, who have been born and educated under 
Pagan and Mohamedan influences j who are 
hastening to the close of life, ignorant of life's 
great end, and seeing nothing before them but an 
impenetrable darkness. With all these, if you are 
a true Christian, you must feel a lively sympathy ; 
and that sympathy may find expression, sometimes 
in your personal counsels and expostulations, and 
sometimes in your pecuniary contributions and 
prayers. That professing Christian who keeps his 
hand clenched against the claims of those whom 
his voice cannot reach, who is willing occasion- 
ally to drop a word of advice upon the ear r but 
is never found dropping his contribution into the 
charity box, had better examine his sympathy, 
lest it should prove to be that which meets the 



SYMPATHY. 165 

sufferer's application with the answer, " Be ye 
warmed and be ye clothed, depart in peace." 

I will only add, that the sufferings of the 
oppressed, present a claim upon your sympathy — 
I mean especially, the oppressed in our own 
happy, yet dishonoured country. Let no man 
tell me that the slave who has nothing that he 
can call his own — not even his wife and children 
— no, nor yet himself, is after all not an object 
to be pitied. If the poor creature who says this, 
will consent to change places with him, then we 
will believe that he is himself rather to be pitied 
as a fool, than abhorred as a knave. But the 
truth is, no man in the exercise of sober reason 
ever believed this. Slavery is an evil, the depth 
of which there is no line to measure. Its subject 
is robbed of the rights which God has given hirn 
— the right even to be a man. I have no sympa- 
thy with the violent and denunciatory spirit on 
this subject that has of late years been going forth 
through the land, not only because it is wrong in 
itself, but because its tendency manifestly is to 
retard and embarrass the cause of emancipation. 
The whole subject is certainly encompassed with 
great difficulties, and involves complicated and 



166 FORGIVENESS OF INJURIES. 

delicate relations which must not be overlooked ; 
but, instead of yielding to these difficulties, we 
are bound to rise with the magnitude of the 
occasion, and urge to some effective, and, if possi- 
ble, speedy, measures, by which we may cancel 
this debt which we owe, as a nation, to justice 
and humanity. I counsel you not to repress, but 
to cultivate your sympathy for the poor slave; 
and if you do not live to see his chain broken, 
be able at least to reflect, when you die, that you 
have borne testimony against the reproach, and 
that whatsoever your hand found to do, you have 
done, for wiping it away. 



LETTER XIII. 

FORGIVENESS OF INJURIES. 

Never, perhaps, was there an individual who 
had deeper injuries to forgive, and never one who 
forgave more cordially and promptly, than Joseph. 
As the facts which illustrate this trait in his 



FORGIVENESS OF INJURIES. 167 

character are interwoven with his whole history, 
and as I shall have occasion to advert to them 
somewhat in detail as I pass along, I shall not, 
at this point, attempt any thing like a connected 
view of them. The injurious treatment which 
Joseph received, has been brought to your consid- 
eration in a preceding letter ; and, in connection 
with it, the dangers to which all young men are 
exposed, who are placed in similar circumstances. 
My design now is, to illustrate the noble spirit 
of forgiveness which Joseph evinced towards those 
who persecuted him, as an example for you amidst 
the provocations and insults which you may pro- 
bably have to encounter. 

Forgiveness is nothing more than the spirit of 
benevolence acting itself out in an appropriate 
manner towards one who has intentionally injured 
you. Suppose'an individual — be it that it is one 
of your ow r n companions — has wantonly and 
malignantly assailed your character, or injured 
your property, or deprived you of some legitimate 
right — what course, under these circumstances, 
are you to adopt in respect to him ? Doubtless, if 
you take counsel of the evil propensities of your 
nature, or the corrupt maxims of the world, you 



168 FORGIVENESS OF INJURIES. 

will set yourself to devise some effective mode of 
retaliation. But if you yield to the dictates of 
an enlightened conscience, or if you consult the 
teachings of the Great Master as recorded in his 
word, you will adopt a very different course — 
you will not only suppress a malevolent spirit, 
but you will call into exercise a benevolent one : 
you will turn away from all those considerations 
which are fitted to wound and exasperate, and 
keep in your eye those only which are adapted to 
preserve or restore the calmness of your mind, and 
to favour a speedy reconciliation. 

But to be more particular — you are to inquire, 
in the first place, whether you have not given 
some occasion for the injury that has been done 
you ; or, if you are conscious of innocent inten- 
tions, whether some action of yours may not have 
been misconstrued, and whether from that miscon- 
struction may not have originated the injustice 
that you have received. In the former case, 
your duty manifestly is to confess — in the 
latter, to explain ; and if you suffer carelessness, 
or an imagined self respect, or any thing else, to 
prevent you from doing this at the very earliest 
moment, you are, in a measure at least, responsi- 



FORGIVENESS OF INJURIES. 169 

Die for the injury of which you complain. If you 
have really been the aggressor in any degree, or 
have given the semblance of provocation for the 
affront you have received, — so far regard your- 
self as the offender ; and do not shrink from the 
most frank and manly reparation. Or, if you have 
been suspected of something of which you were 
innocent, you are bound, if you can, to furnish 
to the individual, evidence of your innocence, that 
he may see there was no just ground for the evil 
he had done you. Having done this, you have 
done all in the character of an offender or a 
supposed offender, which, at this point, either 
justice or charity demands of you. 

But, let us consider your attitude now as 
changed, and inquire whether you have any duty 
to perform towards an enemy beyond the point 
which we have reached — in other words, suppos- 
ing you have made every apology and explanation 
that could be required of you, — are you absolved 
from all farther obligation in respect to the 
offending individual ? I answer, by no means. 
You may have done every thing that you can 
directly to bring about a reconciliation; but 

there may be indirect means which it is in your 
11 



170 FOE.GIVENESS OF INJURIES. 

power to use ; which may not improbably prove 
effectual when the others have failed. You may. 
for instance, in your casual meetings with the 
individual in social life, or even in the street. 
make it manifest by your manner that you are 
cherishing towards him no ill will, and that it is 
not your own fault that the alienation is continued. 
You may sometimes accomplish much through 
the interposition of some friend whose general 
opinion he respects, and who, he would not be 
likely to suppose, could be influenced by any 
undue regard to your interests. You should 
watch for opportunities of doing him good, 
where you can, without the appearance of being 
obtrusive, as if you would make a display of your 
magnanimity ; and especially you should avail 
yourself of such opportunities as may occur when 
he is in affliction; for the heart is never so 
sensible to favours, as when smitten by the rod 
of God ; and a revengeful spirit is never so easily 
dislodged by kindness, as when that kindness is 
delicately manifested to assuage the current of 
grief. You should keep an eye out to observe 
the least indication of a willingness to be recon- 
ciled 5 and you should promptly avail yourself of 



FORGIVENESS OF INJURIES. 171 

it to institute the most effective measures for 
consummating the desired object. You should 
not be strict to require the most exact reparation 
for the injury you have received ; but should 
show yourself willing to accept even what you 
may deem but a partial reparation; and if the 
individual, from pride or any other cause, refuses 
to make any reparation at all, other than is 
involved in a disposition to return to the mutual 
interchange of friendly feelings and good offices 
— though this certainly would not be so satisfac- 
tory as could be desired, yet it would be your 
wisdom to accept even of this, and let the rest 
be an account for him to settle with his own 
conscience. But suppose all your efforts to bring 
about a reconciliation prove futile, and after the 
utmost you can do, you can find no access to his 
heart, and he shows himself determined to hold 
no other than a hostile attitude towards you — 
why then nothing remains for you but to keep 
your heart with all diligence in relation to him, 
and obey that injunction of the Saviour from which 
no possible circumstances can ever absolve you, 
— "Love your enemies, bless them that curse 



172 FORGIVENESS OF INJURIES. 

you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for 
them that despitefully use you and persecute you." 

There are several mistakes into which you are 
liable to fall in relation to the general subject of 
forgiveness of injuries, which the contemplation 
of Joseph's example will be likely to prevent. 
Let me call your attention to two or three of 
them. 

You may be liable to take up the opinion that 
while the smaller injuries to which you are 
exposed may well enough be met with a forgiving 
spirit, there are some injuries that are too great to 
be forgiven, and which no one can forgive in 
consistency with suitable self respect. But who, 
let me ask, ever experienced greater injuries than 
Joseph ? His brethren had no ground of accusa- 
tion against him — he seems to have been entirely 
an amiable, gentle, unassuming youth ; and even 
when he was seized, he was out upon an errand 
that showed the kindness of his heart. What 
they first intended to do was to put him to death, 
outright; and then the expedient of throwing 
him into the pit was thought of; and finally they 
formed and executed the horrible purpose of 
selling him as a slave, with no other expectation 



FORGIVENESS OF INJURIES. 173 

than that he would never behold the faces of any 
of his kindred again, and that, henceforth, till 
death should come to his release, he would always 
be subject to the will of some cruel taskmaster. 
Conceive, if you can, of injury more deep, more 
bitter, than was here inflicted; and yet it was 
not too great for the amiable Joseph to forgive. 
When, years after this, he met his brethren in 
Egypt, and those melting scenes which the history 
relates, occurred, — though Joseph fully appre- 
ciated the extent of the injury, and had all the 
cruel looks and words and actions which had 
been directed against him, treasured up in his 
memory, yet he forgave every thing : he met the 
offenders — great offenders as they were — in the 
spirit of a generous reconciliation. And so, my 
young friends, ought it ever to be with you. No 
matter w^hat may be the wrong that has been 
done you, you have no right to cherish a malevo- 
lent or unforgiving spirit for a moment. Does 
Joseph's character seem less attractive to you fo. 
his having forgiven his brethren even the sin ol 
fratricide toward him? Rather, is it not the 
greatness of the injury that throws such superla- 
tive lustre around the forgiving act? Imitate 



174 FORGIVENESS OF INJURIES. 

Joseph in forgiving great injuries; and if there 
are those who sneer at this as indicating tameness 
or servility, you will have nothing to fear ; for it 
is a light thing to bear the sneers, either of base 
hypocrites or of miserable fools. 

It was an aggravating circumstance in the case 
of Joseph, that the injuries which he received 
were from his own brethren — children of the 
same father — the nearest relatives that he had on 
earth. You may observe, as a general rule, that 
quarrels in families are the bitterest quarrels that 
ever occur ; and where two brothers become 
alienated from each other — no matter from what 
cause — reconciliation becomes exceedingly diffi- 
cult, if not absolutely hopeless. It would seem 
that, where an alienation is once effected in such 
a case, its intensity is generally proportioned to 
the strength of the affection which it has displaced. 
It may result from various causes ; but probably 
it originates more frequently in the distribution 
of the parental inheritance than any thing else. 
Let those who sustain to each other this endearing 
relation, be careful that it never becomes poisoned 
by dissension and crimination. Rather submit in 
silence to what you may deem great injustice, 



FORGIVENESS OF INJURIES. 175 

than run the hazard of opening a domestic 
quarrel. Or, if you are so unhappy as to be 
already engaged in one, resolve, before reading 
another sentence of this letter, that you will 
instantly drop it. It is at too great expense 
that you quarrel with your own brother. Let 
the breach be continued a little longer, and it 
may be impossible ever to repair it; and you 
may be obliged to carry with you to the grave 
the reflection that he who should have been a 
chief mourner at your funeral, if he is there at 
all, will be there only as a matter of decency and 
constraint. 

It is worthy of remark that Joseph forgave his 
brethren, when he had them entirely in his power 
— just as entirely as they had hi/u : when they 
inflicted the injury. However weak and defence- 
less he was when they met him at Dothan, he 
was surrounded with the insignia of office when 
they found him in Egypt — the little unprotected 
boy had become the governour of the land ; and 
he could do with them whatsoever he listed 
without being called in question for any course 
that he might adopt. He might have banished 
them instantly from his dominion, or he might 



176 FORGIVENESS OF INJURIES. 

have consigned them to perpetual imprisonment, 
or he might have served them as the poor baker 
was served, whose dream he had occasion to 
interpret ; but, instead of adopting any such 
rigorous and retaliatory measures, he freely 
forgave them the injury. Perhaps, in certain 
cases, where you consider yourself aggrieved, 
you will seem ready enough to forgive — particu- 
larly in cases where the offender may be useful 
to you, and you can anticipate no advantage 
from persisting in your resentment; — but are 
you equally disposed to reconciliation, where you 
have him entirely in your power, and can do him 
a serious injury, perhaps without incurring the 
odium of it before the world ? While a case of 
this kind involves great temptation to cultivate 
an implacable spirit, it furnishes a fine^pportunity 
to display a magnanimous one. If you forgive 
only where your own personal interest would 
manifestly be promoted by it, and where you 
have little or no power to inflict an injury , it may 
be worth while for you to inquire whether you 
have really exercised the forgiving spirit at all. 
If your enemy is in your power, let him feel, so 
far as any act of injustice is concerned, that he is 



FORGIVENESS OF INJURIES. 177 

safe in your power. Never take any advantage 
in respect to him, that you would not feel justified 
in taking, if he were your friend. It is not only 
unjust, but mean and cowardly, to do him an 
injury, because you can do it — perhaps without 
detection. 

Joseph manifested a forgiving spirit by a 
corresponding course of action. He ultimately 
took from his brethren every ground of suspicion 
in regard to his sincerity, by performing towards 
them a succession of the most fraternal and 
generous acts. He not only relieved their imme- 
diate necessities, but made provision for their 
permanent subsistence in circumstances in every 
way the most agreeable to them. Here again, I 
commend him to you as a model. I have known 
cases, not a few, in which individuals have 
deceived themselves in supposing that they had 
forgiven an enemy, when they had reached the 
point of being willing not to attempt to injure 
him — willing to let him alone ; and yet I have 
generally remarked that, where this negative 
course was professed, a more positive course was 
practised ; and that, on some occasions at least, 
the individual supposed to be forgiven, would be 
12 



178 FORGIVENESS OF IXJTEEES. 

the object, if not of direct attacks, yet of offensive 
allusions. The truth is. you utterly mistake, if 
you imagine that you have forgiven an enemy 
when you have only got so far as to pass him in 

silence and neglect, You must be able to meet 
him with feelings and demonstrations of good 
will. And the more decisive these demonstra- 
tions are, the better — the better for him — the 
better for yourself, If, after a professed recon- 
ciliation, your conduct towards him savours of 
shyness, and is at best of an equivocal character, 
he will have no confidence in your professions, 
and you will have no comfort in his society : and 
you will both probably settle down with the 
conviction that, though you have gone through 
the form of reconciliation, the old grudge holds 
good. But if, on the contrary, you meet him in 
the spirit of good will and generosity, and espe- 
cially, if you avail yourself of the first opportunity 
to show him some substantial act of kindness, he 
will give you full credit for sincerity, and will 
probably meet you with a corresponding spirit, 
and thus a real and permanent reconciliation will 
be secured. It is really one of the noblest attri- 
butes of a noble soul, to be able to render good 



FORGIVENESS OF INJURIES. 179 

for evil — especially to confer great benefits upon 
one from whom great injuries have been received. 
Joseph forgave his brethren in a way that was 
fitted to exert the happiest influence upon their 
tempers. He might indeed, as soon as they 
appeared before him in Egypt, and he recognized 
them as the brethren who had sold him as a slave 
— he might have revealed to them at once the 
astounding fact that he was their brother, and 
have given them free and immediate access to a 
brother's heart. But, though his first feelings 
might have prompted to this, it instantly occurred 
to him that those brethren had committed a great 
offence, not only against himself, but against their 
father, and against God: and that it was fitting 
that they should be made sensible of it, and 
should be brought to contemplate it with a truly 
repentant spirit. And with a view to secure this 
end, and not because he desired to see them even 
temporarily unhappy, he instituted that singular 
course of measures by which they were so severely 
tried, up to the time that he made himself known 
to them. Their being imprisoned as spies, Simeon 
being detained as an hostage, the affair of the 
silver cup, and that whole series of events, which 



180 FORGIVENESS OF EsJTTHIES. 

kept them so long in anxiety and distress, and 
sometimes even consternation, were designed — 
fraternally and mercifully designed, to make 
them hearty penitents in view of their misconduct, 
and to prepare them for the blessings which were 
yet in store for them. And the desired effect 
was produced — conscience was stirred up to do 
its office; and in the fearful punishment which 
they apprehended, as well as in the extremity to 
which they were actually brought, they saw the 
enormity of the crime of which they had been 
guilty. And in this respect also Joseph is an 
example for you. It is one important part 
of the duty you owe to the person who has 
injured you, to make him sensible, if possible, of 
the evil of his conduct, and lead him to cultivate 
such a temper that he shall at once be worthy of 
your forgiveness, and able rightly to appreciate it, 
and suitably to profit by it. 

The considerations which urge you to the culti- 
vation of a forgiving spirit, I shall only hint at in 
a single word. It is in itself one of the noblest 
exercises of a virtuous temper, and one of the 
greatest triumphs over a corrupt and grovelling 
selfishness. It blesses both him who forgives and 



FILIAL REGARD. 181 

him who is forgiven, and operates like a charm 
to allay the withering strifes of society. It is 
one of the prescribed conditions on which we 
may hope for the forgiveness of our offences 
here, and our open acquittal at the judgment. 
It is the spirit which animated the Saviour of the 
world; — which manifested itself in his doctrines 
and precepts and example, and which breathed 
in all its fulness and vigour amidst the scenes of 
Calvary. Ponder each of these considerations 
till it shall have exerted its full influence upon 
you ; and like Joseph, and like a greater than 
Joseph, ever exemplify the forgiving spirit. 



LETTER XW. 



FILIAL REGARD. 



I design, in this letter, to address you in respect to 
the feelings and conduct appropriate to the filial 
relation. It might seem as if nature herself had 
made such provision for the development of the filial 



182 FILIAL REGARD. 

principle, that little need be said to give it the right 
direction, or secure its legitimate end ; and yet the 
fact turns out to be, that there is scarcely a principle 
belonging to our constitution, that requires more 
vigilant attention, or more careful culture, than this. 
I fear that truth constrains to the acknowledgment 
that the period on which you have fallen, is distin- 
guished above any preceding period in modern 
times, for the want of filial respect; and happy 
indeed shall I be, if, by holding up Joseph before 
you as a model, I shall succeed in reviving in your 
minds the ancient spirit of reverence towards 
parents, and of leading you to feel that, if you 
will be true to one of the noblest instincts of your 
nature, you must honour your father and your 
mother. 

I had occasion to remark to you in the 
preceding letter that Joseph's forgiving spirit had 
impressed itself upon his whole history ; and the 
same is true of his filial regard — it is so inter- 
woven with all the important events of his life, 
that an attempt to separate it from them, would be 
nothing less than an attempt completely to falsify 
the narrative. Joseph was too yo".ng when his 
mother died, to know the strength of maternai 



FILIAL REGARD. 183 

love or the value of maternal care ; bu't towards 
his. father, who lived till after the son had reached 
his maturity, he showed himself one of the most 
perfect models in the filial relation that history can 
furnish. 

The earliest development of the filial principle 
that comes within our knowledge is affection : the 
very first exercises of feeling which the child 
discovers, that are in any degree independent of 
its physical nature — certainly the first feelings 
of an amiable character, may be read in the 
tenacity with which it clings to its mother, and 
in the smile into which a mother's love works its 
infantile features. And, doubtless, the feeling of 
affection towards both parents, has the precedence, 
in the order of nature, above any other. Joseph, 
from his earliest years, evidently manifested 
toward his father a devoted attachment ; and 
probably the great strength of his filial affection 
was one circumstance that made him so much an 
object of parental partiality, and was finally the 
occasion of bringing upon him such severe trials. 
But it was in his later years that his affection 
had an opportunity to manifest itself in the most 
decided demonstrations. Notice the affectionate 



184 FILIAL REGARD. 

inquiry which he made of his brethren concerning 
their father's health, while yet they had not begun 
to suspect that their father was also his. Notice 
the charge which he gave them to bring their 
father — the old man, down, that he might set 
eyes upon him. And after he had revealed to 
them the secret that he was Joseph, observe that 
the very first question which he asked them was, 
"Doth my father yet live?" — and forthwith he 
renews with still greater earnestness the charge 
which he had previously given — " Haste you, 
and go up to my father, and say unto him, thus 
saith thy son Joseph, God hath made me lord of 
all Egypt : come down unto me — tarry not." 
And above all, notice the account of the first 
meeting between him and his father in the land 
of Goshen, and see him dissolved in tears, hanging 
upon his father's neck ; and say whether you can 
imagine a scene in which the very sublimity of 
filial affection should be more strikingly mani- 
fested. And then you remember what provision 
he made for his father's comfort:— how carefully 
and tenderly he watched over his old age; how 
he hastened to his dying bed to minister to his 
last wants and receive his final blessing; — how, 



FILIAL REGAJtD. 185 

even after the patriarch had yielded up the ghost, 
the dutiful, affectionate son still "fell upon his 
father's face, and wept upon him, and kissed 
him;" and how, finally, after a public lamenta- 
tion had been made for him, he obeyed his dying 
command in having him removed for burial to 
the spot which he had designated in the land of 
Canaan. You see that Joseph's affection for his 
father was far enough from being an inactive 
principle: it discovered itself in every act of 
obedience and kindness which his own ability 
permitted, or his father's necessities required. 

Joseph, you perceive, treated his father with 
the greatest respect and reverence. And this 
was not a constrained feeling — it was the legit- 
imate working of that strong filial affection, 
which was inwrought among the deepest sensi- 
bilities of his nature. But this is nothing more 
than is due to the parental relation. You are to 
reverence your parents as those whom Providence 
has constituted your superiors and guardians : 
and you are to give expression to this spirit by 
every appropriate means. Especially, you should 
beware that you do not pervert the affectionate 
familiarity to which they may admit you, to 



186 FILIAL REGARD. 

purposes of disrespect : you should not too hastily 
call in question their opinions, and if you have 
occasion to dissent from them, should do it in 
a spirit of becoming modesty: you should not 
show yourself disposed to monopolize or direct 
the conversation in which they are taking a part, 
but should rather give place to them, and 
remember that, on such occasions especially, one 
important part of your duty is to listen — in 
short, you should let it appear, on every occasion, 
both in publick and private, that you cherish 
toward them a profound respect, and that you 
are ready to defer to them in every thing that 
shall not interfere with the sober convictions of 
your judgment and conscience. 

I am aware that there are cases to which these 
remarks, in all their extent, cannot apply; for, 
unhappily, there are some children who have 
parents whose characters are such as to forbid 
and repel even filial respect. The child who 
sees his father fall down drunk, and hears him 
deal out vulgarity and blasphemy, and dreads 
his return home, lest it should be the harbinger 
of a night of terror and weeping to his mother, 
cannot, ought not, to reverence that father, as if 



FILIAL REGARD. 187 

he were a pattern of the domestick virtues. Still, 
however, even in this case, there is something 
due to the parental relation. It is, to say the 
least, exceedingly offensive to all good taste, and 
I may add, contrary to the dictates of nature, for 
a child in these circumstances to seem willing, as 
is sometimes the case, to expose a father's vices. 
You may not indeed be forbidden in all circum- 
stances to speak of them — that may sometimes be 
necessary j but let it always be in a manner that 
shall show that you have not forgotten that the 
offender is your father, and that you earnestly 
desire to render him a full share of filial respect. 
There may be cases in which it is proper for you, 
even to address him directly in regard to his evil 
doings, and to put forth a vigorous effort to 
recover him to virtue and usefulness. But this 
is perhaps the most delicate office which a child 
ever has to perform; for, in this case, he seems 
to change places with the father: and however 
well intended and well performed may be the 
duty which he takes upon himself, there is always 
danger that it will be met with irritation and 
disgust. If you are ever providentially called to 
the discharge of this painful duty towards a 



188 FILIAL REGARD. 

parent, be careful that you select the most 
favourable time — a time when his mind is most 
free from unnatural excitement and most open to 
conviction ; and if you can select some moment 
when he is suffering immediately the effect of his 
vices, or when some calamitous dispensation hath 
overtaken him, that will probably be the most 
favoured moment of all. And let there be every 
thing in your manner to evince that you approach 
the duty with the utmost reluctance and pain, 
and that it is because you love your father with 
strong affection that you cannot look upon his 
ruin and remain silent. Let what you say be 
considerately and discreetly weighed, before you 
say it ; and, in ordinary cases, if you will secure 
the best impression, better not have the conver- 
sation a very protracted one. What you must 
rely upon chiefly, under the blessing of Heaven, 
is the spirit of filial affection coming out in such 
a way as to keep down resentment, to disarm 
parental authority, and to open a way to the 
heart for a solemn, affectionate, earnest expostu- 
lation. 

But you are to obey your parents as well as 
reverence them — indeed you cannot reverence 



FILIAL REGARD. 189 

them as you ought, but that obedience is secured 
as a matter of course. Whatever command 
Joseph received from his father, he obeyed 
cordially and promptly. If his father directed 
him, when a child, to go and visit his brethren 
who were keeping their flocks, he went without 
offering a single objection. If his father directed 
him, when governour of Egypt, to convey his 
mortal remains back to the land of Canaan for 
burial, here again there was no time lost in obey- 
ing this command. And we have no reason to 
believe that his father ever addressed to him either 
a command or a request, but it was complied 
with at the very earliest moment possible. What 
a beautiful exemplification was this of the filial 
spirit ! 

My young friend " go thou and do likewise." 
But remember that you do not come up fully to 
the spirit of the duty that is here required of you, 
merely by doing sooner or later, and in some 
way or other, the external act, which parental 
authority may enjoin. You must not only obey, 
but you must obey promptly. Suppose the service 
required of you be not exactly that which is most 
in accordance with your taste, or inclination, or 



190 FILIAL REGARD. 

even judgment — I do not say that you are not 
at liberty, in such a case, respectfully to state 
your opinion, or offer a suggestion, but it ill 
becomes you to take the attitude of an objector 
or a caviller, and virtually tell your father that 
you must at least have an argument with him, 
before you shall do the thing which he requires. 
As a general rule, the intimation of a parent's 
desire should be enough to determine your 
conduct; and none but a parent who has had 
experience, can know how great is the difference 
between that obedience which , is thus promptly 
and cordially rendered, and that which waits for 
a repetition of the parental mandate, and which 
after all is of a constrained and stinted character.' 

You will anticipate me when I say that, as 
vicious qualities in parents are not to be reve- 
renced, so neither are their commands to do evil, 
to be obeyed. But here it often becomes an 
exceedingly delicate question how far you may 
go in what may seem doubtful compliances, rather 
than take the attitude of opposition to parental 
authority. In cases of this kind, you must judge 
by the best lights that you can command ; and it 
will generally be discreet in you to refer such 



FILIAL REGARD. 191 

questions to some maturer wisdom and experience 
than your own. But when the thing that is 
required of you is manifestly and palpably wrong, 
— no matter by what considerations it may be 
urged, — you need not even ask yourself the 
question whether you shall obey, for God has 
already settled that question at your hands. You 
must not even connive at evil, though the conse- 
quence should be that you are cut off from the 
paternal inheritance, or turned out of the paternal 
dwelling. Such extreme cases, however, rarely 
occur ; and even when a parent thus perverts his 
authority by requiring at the hands of his child 
what cannot be rendered in consistency with a 
good conscience, the child will, very often at least, 
by respectfully stating his convictions and remon- 
strating against the thing required of him, relieve 
himself from the alternative of either violating his 
conscience or disobeying his father. 

I will only add that the filial spirit properly 
brought into exercise, will, if necessary, and if 
possible, provide for the comfort of parents in 
the decline of life. It was worth all that Joseph 
had suffered from the persecution of his brethren, 
and even being exiled so long from his beloved 



192 FILIAL REGARD. 

father, to be able to act the father towards 
in his latter years: indeed, for the pleasure of 
that one meeting — the welcome, the embrace, 
the paternal benediction, what generous minded 
son would not stand ready to make any sacrifice ? 
Possibly your parents may have been unfortunate 
in life ; and, after having supplied your early 
wants, and educated you to some useful pursuit, 
they may have themselves become poor; and 
now, as old age is advancing upon them, they 
may be without the means of procuring even the 
comforts of life. If you have a spark of filial 
sensibility, you will never see them suffer — you 
will not oblige them even to ask your aid — your 
generous interposition will at least be as quick as 
their own thoughts ; and you will not rest till 
their wants are provided for, even though your 
own lot may not rise above an humble mediocrity. 
But, admitting that they stand in no need of 
pecuniary aid, there are other things besides 
money that can minister to the comfort of old 
age. Your filial attentions — your frequent visits, 
if you are separated from them — your delicate 
expressions of respect and veneration, will all 
operate as a cordial to their spirits; and these 



FILIAL REGARD. 193 

will be more precious to them than any comforts 
that opulence could bring within their reach. 
Especially if they are sick, you should hasten, 
with filial tenderness, to their bed side ; and let 
them see that you are vigilant in respect to every 
thing that can promote their comfort; and even, 
when they come to be in the twilight of life, let 
them reflect, if it may be so, that their beloved 
children are among the last objects of their 
mortal vision. I can hardly forbear envying 
that son who has at once the disposition and the 
opportunity of smoothing the path of his aged 
parents to the grave. 

I had intended to say something in the conclu- 
sion of this letter, to urge to the cultivation of 
this spirit ; but it so obviously appeals to whatever 
is generous and noble in human nature, that I am 
willing to leave the whole subject with you 
without another word. I will, however, just 
add, that the absence of this spirit in a young 
man marks him as an object at once to be pitied 
and to be avoided; and that its existence is 
regarded, and justly regarded, as one of the best 
pledges of a virtuous and useful character. 
12 



194 DEPENDANCE ON GOD : 



LETTER XV. 



DEPENDANCE ON GOD. 



Every thing that has been said in the preced- 
ing letters has taken for granted that Joseph 
was a truly religious man. You have seen how 
his most ordinary actions were evidently dictated 
by a regard to principle and .conscience ; how 
sincerity and benevolence breathed in all his 
social intercourse, and stern integrity marked 
every step of his course as a man of business. 
But I design, in the present letter, to bring him 
before you more immediately in the relations 
which he sustained to God ; or rather to show 
you how the sentiment of depend ance on God 
operated as the controlling principle of his life. 
I might point to various facts in his history — 
such as his recognition of divine aid in his inter- 
pretation of the dreams, or rather his referring 
the whole matter to the direct agency of Heaven, 
— his commending his brethren to the mercy of 






DEPENDENCE ON GOD. 195 

Almighty God, when he sent them back to his 
father, and other similar circumstances ; but it is 
enough to say that this attribute of his character 
manifests itself, directly or indirectly, at every 
point of his history. He evidently acted, habitu- 
ally, under a deep impression of an all-seeing, 
all-controlling God. And this same spirit I would 
urge you to cultivate, as the leading element of 
true piety — as the germ of Christian character. 

By the spirit of dependance, I mean that spirit 
which recognizes your own weakness, and which 
relies, in a suitable manner, on help from on high. 
It has reference both to your temporal and spiritual 
needs. I hardly need say that its appropriate 
expression is prayer. 

In every thing that relates to the present life 
you are to cherish a due sense of dependance on 
God. Trivial as the interests of this life may 
seem, compared with those of another, it still has 
its importance ; and when considered in its relation 
to a future life, an importance that outruns all 
calculation. In respect to these interests — no 
matter whether they be the higher or the lower 
interests of life. — infinite power, wisdom, good- 
ness, are to be acknowledged. For instance, you 



196 DEPENDAXCE OX GOB. 

are to watch carefully the indications of Provi- 
dence, and to seek the higher aids of God's Spirit. 
m regard to the choice of your profession or 
occupation for life ; for. if you happen to mistake 
here, and make a choice which your talents and 
circumstances do not justify, you may bring upon 
yourself calamities from which no subsequent 
effort will be able to deliver you. You are to 
trust in God, not only for guidance in respect to 
the field which you are to occupy, but for the 
ability to occupy it with success, and for a blessing 
to crown your labours. You are liable sometime? 
to be placed in circumstances of difficulty and 
embarrassment — to see your worldly prospects 
clouded, and your path apparently hedged up — 
here again, you are to direct your eye upward ; — 
you are to seek relief from the power that rules the 
world. In a word, you are to trust God for every 
needed temporal blessing — you are to trust his 
wisdom to decide what blessings are best for you, 
and his power and goodness, to bestow them. 

But there is a nobler life than this — there is an 
inward spiritual life which developes itself in holy 
exercises and actions : there is a future immortal 
life, that is to be the theatre of the endless growth 



DEPENDANCE ON GOD. 197 

and glory of the spirit, and for which the present 
is chiefly important as constituting the scene of 
preparation. And in all that respects these nobler 
forms, of existence and action, your dependance on 
God is specially to be acknowledged. First of 
all, you are to cast yourself upon him as an 
offending creature. Deeply sensible of your 
unworthiness, you are to rely on his mercy, 
through the mediation of Christ, for the pardon 
of your sins, and his grace for the cleansing and 
renovation of your soul. In all your spiritual 
difficulties, you are to look to him for direction ; 
in ail your temptations, for succour ; in all your 
sorrows, for comfort; in all your weakness, for 
strength, Even though you may have been the 
subject of a true renovation, you will probably 
often find yourself at a distance from God, and 
perhaps your progress in the Christian life may 
be so slow and equivocal, that you may be ready to 
doubt whether what you called Christian expe- 
rience was not gross delusion. In all these cir- 
cumstances, w r hat you have to do is to bring to 
your aid, by living faith, the resources of bound- 
less grace. Thus making God your refuge and 
strength, you will be enabled to forget the things 



198 DEPENDANCE ON GOD. 

that are behind, and press forward ; and your 
path will shine brighter and brighter unto the per- 
fect day. 

The great importance of cultivating this principle 
of dependance on God, will be obvious from two 
considerations. It is itself the primary element of 
religious character, and it is that which, in its 
legitimate operation, gathers around it some other 
of the loveliest graces and virtues of the Christian. 

A moment's reflection will show you that it 
precedes, in the order of nature, all the other 
graces. Indeed, if it may not be said to precede 
the formation of Christian character, it is at least 
associated with the very earliest exercises of true 
piety ; for it is not till the soul feels its absolute 
dependance on God for salvation, that it is brought 
to yield itself up to him in acts of repentance 
and faith. Without this spirit, no one ever 
offers up acceptable prayer : the publican could 
not have exclaimed with sincerity — u God be 
merciful to me a sinner I" — if he had not felt 
that he was entirely dependant on God for 
the blessing that he supplicated. Remember 
then j if you have not had such views of your 
own weakness and guilt and unworthiness, as 



DEPEND ANCE ON GOD. 199 

to make you deeply realize that salvation, if it 
comes to you at all, must come from God, — you 
have never been the subject of a genuine conver- 
sion — you have never offered to God acceptable 
homage. 

But you are to view this spirit also in its relation 
to other Christian qualities, particularly humility, 
submission, gratitude, and activity. 

What is there that can make you humble, if 
it be not a sense of your dependance on God? 
If you feel that you are indebted entirely to your 
own industry or skill for your temporal blessings, 
and that you may safely trust to your own merit 
for all the spiritual blessings that you need, the 
consequence will necessarily be that you will be 
full of pride and self confidence; — you will 
never come to take lessons from the cross; — - 
you will scorn the humbling provision— the only 
provision which the gospel makes — for your 
salvation. But if, on the other hand, you feel 
that you are at best short-sighted and impotent— 
that you are liable to be deceived where you are 
most sure of being right, and liable to fail where 
you are most confident of success; if you are 
deeply sensible that you owe a debt to divine 



200 DEPENDANCE ON GOD. 

justice that you can never pay, and that, if you 
are finally saved, it must be by a special divine 
and gracious interposition ; if, in short, you feel 
that you are a debtor to God's abounding mercy 
for every thing temporal and every thing spiritual 
— for all that you enjoy and all that you hope 
for, — then I ask, how you can avoid being 
humble ? If it is God who makes you to differ 
from others whose lot is less favoured — if God 
is the bountiful bestower, and you the unworthy 
recipient, and you sensibly feel this, you are 
humble as a matter of course — you walk humbly 
with God — you walk humbly before the world. 
And I need not explain to you the difference 
between that proud spirit which goeth before a 
fall, and that humble spirit which is the signal for 
being exalted. 

So also a suitable dependance on God is a 
security for submission to the divine will. If you 
trust to your own wisdom, or that of your fellow 
creatures, to order your lot, scorning the idea 
that you stand in need of any superhuman guid- 
ance, you will be ill prepared for disappointment : 
and when it comes, you will indulge in unavailing 
regrets, and equally unavailing reproaches. You 



DEPEND ANCE ON GOD. 201 

will blame the eye that was so blind, or the hand 
that was so feeble, or the heart that was so base, 
as to frustrate your favourite purposes ; or possibly 
you may fall upon yourself in bitter accusations 
for having negligently betrayed your own inte- 
rests. But, if you cast all your cares upon God, 
and confide all your interests to his providence 
and grace, recognizing his hand not only in the 
blessings that cheer you but in the sorrows that 
make your heart desolate, — then you will be 
prepared for scenes of trial — prepared to submit 
to them without repining, because that wisdom in 
which you are accustomed to exercise an implicit 
confidence has ordained them. It was but the 
other day that I received a letter from a young 
female, informing me that her father, who has 
long been known as one of the greatest and best 
men of the age, had been suddenly — in the 
twinkling of an eye — stricken down by death. 
It was the greatest affliction that she could 
have experienced; for not only was she hereby 
deprived of one of the best of fathers, but was 
now, for the first time, thrown upon her own 
resources in respect to the general direction of the 
interests of her family. But, in the days of 



202 DEPENDANCE ON GOD. 

prosperity, she had been accustomed to cultivate 
a constant feeling of trust in God; and every 
sentence in her sad letter showed that, now thai 
the day of adversity had come, she was not taken 
by surprize — that her spirit had already been 
disciplined for the trial, and that she was reposing 
in humble submission in the perfect wisdom and 
goodness of her Heavenly Father. You too must 
expect days of trial ; and, as you would desire to 
be calm when the storm rages, to be resigned 
when earthly comforts fly away, let me exhort 
you to an habitual feeling of dependance on God. 
Gratitude too is another of the graces that 
cluster about this primary form of religious feeling. 
It must be so ; for if you feel that you depend on 
God for every thing — on his providence for 
protection — on his spirit for sanctification, you 
also recognize his har in these blessings ' when 
they are actually b stowed ; and what else is 
thinking of him it- this way as your Benefactor, 
but being gratr ul for his goodness ? Moreover, 
how natural *utt, as you look forward in the spirit 
of dependence to the future, you should connect 
with you anticipations a review of the past ; that, 
with the supplications which this spirit prompts 



DEPENDANCE ON GOD. 203 

for the blessings that you need, thanksgivings 
should also mingle for the mercies which you have 
received. Only take care that you feel sufficiently 
your dependance on God, and you may leave 
the spirit of gratitude to take care of itself — 
the one can not thrive but the other will thrive 
with it. 

I will only add that this temper which I have 
been recommending, is really the spirit of all true 
Christian activity. I well know that the doctrine 
of dependance is often perverted to purposes of 
negligence and sloth. The sinner perverts it to 
the neglect of his salvation — for he reasons thus 
with himself — "If I depend entirely for salvation 
on God's grace, then I have nothing to do but to 
wait till that grace is communicated ; and if it 
never comes, and I am lost in consequence, who 
shall say that I am my own destroyer ?" The 
professed Christian often perverts it to the neglect 
of the most obvious duties of the religious life ; 
" for," says he, " if God's work is to be carried 
forward in the world by his own agency, — if the 
church cannot be revived except by his quickening 
influence, — if the heathen cannot be saved unless 
his arm is revealed for their deliverance, then what 



204 DEPENDANCE ON GOD. 

have I to do, but sit still till God does his own 
work, and then give him the glory ?" Need I say- 
that this is the most egregious sophistry, or rather 
the most miserable trifling ? God has made you a 
moral agent ; and he requires you to act according 
to the laws of your moral nature ; and it is only 
as you obey this requisition, that you have a right 
to expect his blessing. He w T ill give you your 
food and raiment, but you must work for it. He 
will give you grace to help in every time of need : 
but he will communicate it to you through the 
medium of your own activity. . And if you do 
not comply with the terms on which the blessing 
is offered, blame not God — blame only yourself — 
if it be withheld. 

But I have said that this doctrine of depen- 
dance, when viewed aright, instead of being an 
encouragement to sloth, is a stimulant to effort. 
For it carries you out of your own feebleness, 
and brings you into communion with everlasting 
strength. If you were required to discharge the 
duties of the spiritual life especially, in reliance 
on your own resources alone, you might well yield 
to despondency, and attempt nothing ; for, if you 
viewed the matter aright, you could not but feel 



DEPENDANCE ON GOD. 205 

that, in relation to such duties, your own strength 
is weakness. But, since you are privileged to 
bring to yourself by faith and prayer a portion of 
that energy which made the world — since, when 
you are oppressed with a sense of your weakness, 
you can hang on that arm on which the whole 
creation hangs, you have nothing to fear — you 
may go forward with confidence and alacrity ; 
and not a believing and well directed effort that 
you put forth will ultimately miss its object. 
And let me say, this accords with individual 
experience. The most efficient labourers in the 
cause of truth and righteousness have always 
been those who have believed the doctrine of 
dependance without perverting it; who have 
laboured as diligently as if all depended on 
themselves ; who have depended as absolutely 
as if their labours were in no way requisite to 
the blessing. 



PART 111. 



REWARDS THAT CROWN A VIRTUOUS 

COURSE. 



LETTER XVI. 

VIRTUE CROWNED WITH SAFETY. 

If I have accomplished the end which I proposed 
in the preceding letters, I have given you some 
idea of the dangers which you are to meet, and 
of the spirit in which you are to meet them. I 
have shown you the amiable and exemplary Joseph 
cast into a furnace of temptation and affliction, and 
coming out of it like gold seven times purified ; 
and have endeavoured to hold him up to you, 
not only as an illustration of the difficulties and 
trials which you may expect, but as an example of 



208 VHLTUE CROWNED WITH SAFETY. 

the virtues and graces at which you are to aim, 
It only remains that, in the letters which follow, I 
should ask you to contemplate the bright rewards 
with which his course was crowned, as exempli- 
fying, in some degree, the rewards which every 
young man has a right to look for, who walks in 
his steps. 

In a world of danger like this, it is much to say 
that an individual is safe; notwithstanding the 
idea which this involves is rather negative than 
positive. I will endeavour to show you how 
virtue ensures safety — safety both in respect to 
temporal and spiritual evils. 

I do not undertake to say that virtue will be 
an absolute security against all temporal evils ; — 
for we know that this is contradicted by experience. 
Nor do I mean to intimate that the virtuous man 
will always escape injury from his fellow man ; — 
for this idea is refuted by the experience of Joseph 
himself; and we all know that we are to look for 
the history of some of the best men that the world 
has seen, in the records of martyrdom. The truth 
which Joseph's history illustrates, and to which I 
wish now to direct your attention, is, that the good 
man is safe, even when dangers seem to threaten 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH SAFETY, 209 

— safe in any circumstances in which he can be 
ed. 

If you look into the world, you will find that a 
i^cge portion of the evils which individuals suffer 
from their fellow men. are not altogether unpro- 
voked — they have their origin in some previous 
neglect or positive wrong, of which they have 
themselves been guilty. You may indeed have 
received a much greater wrong than you have 
inflicted; but if you had inflicted none at all, 
neither, perhaps, would you have received any. 
Now, against this whole class of evils virtue 
secures you, by leading you to forbear all provo- 
cation. And when an unprovoked injury has 
been inflicted, virtue may not improbably prevent 
the repetition of it, by leading you to meet the 
offender in the spirit of a generous conciliation. 
Let a man who has been injured by another, show 
himself, not indeed insensible to the injury or 
lacking in self respect, but, with a high magnani- 
mous bearing, ready to return good for evil j and 
if he is not henceforth secure against all injury 
from the same source, it is evidence that he has 
fallen into the hands of a fiend and not of a man. 

Besides, there is something in the dignity with 

12* 



210 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH SAFETY. 

which virtue surrounds its possessor, to repel every 
improper freedom — much more every injurious 
assault. There are indeed some who cannot be 
restrained even by this — some who are so debased 
and malignant, that the loftier the virtue, the more 
ready they are to insult and tarnish ; but, in most 
cases, even malignity itself will quail before the 
majesty of exalted principle. 

Moreover, if such an individual be unjustly 
assailed, there are many around who are ready 
to come to his aid. His excellent character, 
as in the case of Joseph, secures, to him excellent 
friends; and they are ever at hand to throw 
themselves as a shield between him and any 
meditated harm of which they may be apprized. 
Even those with whom he may have had no 
particular intimacy, if they see that he is likely 
to suffer, will throng about him for his defence ; 
and perhaps, in the end, he may have no occa- 
sion personally to regret that the injury was 
attempted, as the effect of it has been only to 
show him how much strength he has, in the good 
will of the community at large, as well as in the 
attachment of his personal friends. 

But suppose the very worst that can happen to a 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH SAFETY. 211 

good man — suppose that, like some of our modern 
missionaries, he be surrounded with those who are 
not only thirsting for his blood but literally 
hungering for his flesh, and he sees the fearful 
preparation going forward for taking his life in 
the most barbarous manner — it is possible that 
God may interpose, even then, for his deliverance. 
He who would not suffer Joseph to be left in the 
pit to die, nor to remain in prison for a crime of 
which he was not guilty — He who would not 
suffer the lions to harm Daniel, when he was 
thrown among them, nor the furnace to burn the 
young men when they were cast into it — He 
may find means — and that without resorting to 
a miraculous agency — for effecting the delive- 
rance of an individual, even in the circumstances 
which I have supposed. Be it, however, that no 
such signal interposition occurs, and that he who 
has fallen into the hands of cannibals, actually 
falls a victim to their barbarity — is there any 
safety here? Yes, safety in the best sense — the 
immortal spirit is safe — the faggots that set the 
body on fire, or the sharp instrument that pierces 
the seat of life, only liberates the great imprisoned 
soul, so that it can fly off to its glorious home. 



212 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH SAFETY. 

The martyr, with his head upon the block, is 
safe. Lyman and ilunson and Williams were 
safe, when they felt that the next moment they 
were to be the subjects of a violent and horrible 
death. 

I have attempted to show you. in some preced- 
ing letters, that those evils which affect your 
earthly condition merely, are not the evils from 
which you have most to fear, and, in relation to 
which chiefly, safety is to be regarded as a 
blessing. There are spiritual evils — evils that 
have their seat in the soul, and y if not removed, 
most affect its permanent well-being — nay, entail 
upon it an everlasting death. Let me say, virtue 
— I here and all along use the word in the 
higher and evangelical sense, as including what- 
ever is essential to religious character — virtue 
is an effectual security against these greatest of 
evils. 

Consider its influence in regard to the tempta- 
tions by which you are surrounded. If you 
habitually manifest the spirit of true religion — 
especially if you are a shining example of it — 
there is a large class of temptations which you 
will, by this means, keep at a distance from you 



TOTU! 1TB SAFETY. 213 

— I refer particularly to the dire: 

rompanions to draw you into sin. It is true 
men of corrupt principles and profligate 
are always glad enough to seduce the 
g Christian into forbidden paths ; and where 
they can bring such an one to make shipwreck of 
his religious character, they never fail to chronicle 
it as a victory. But those on whom they are 
most likely to toy their wiles, because most likely 
to succeed, are persons who have already betrayed 
to them some symptoms of backsliding — who 
have furnished them evidence that their principles 
are more easy and accommodating than those of 
professed christians generally. Persons of this 
description — observe it where you will — are 
courted by the gay. the worldly, and sometimes 
even the profligate ; and alas ! the result too 
often shows that the judgment which was formed 
respecting their susceptibility to temptation was 
but too correct. Whereas, on the other hand, 
let an individual stand forth the consistent, 
decided Christian, inquiring only what he ought 
to do in order to decide what he shall do. — and 
he will not be regarded as a good subject for the 
wiles of the wicked to operate upon; — and there 



214 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH SAFETY. 

will be so little confidence of success in respect to 
him, that the effort to tempt and destroy will be 
likely to take some different direction. The men 
who make it their business to ruin others, are 
generally wary enough in selecting those whom 
they intend to make their victims ; and they must 
either be excessively presuming, or greatly lacking 
in discernment, to fasten upon those who are 
models of integrity and virtue. 

But we will suppose that a person of this high 
moral and religious character actually is assailed 
by the enemies of virtue — or, if you please, we 
will view him as brought in contact with the 
various temptations incident to our present condi- 
tion, and growing out of the circumstances in 
which we are placed — temptations which even 
the most vigilant care and the most seraphic piety 
cannot always avert — his advantage now is, that 
he is armed for a conflict with the tempter. 
Toseph could not avoid the criminal solicitations 
of Potiphar's wife ; but his eminent goodness 
made him proof against them. You cannot avoid 
temptations from the various objects w T ith which 
vou are conversant ; the various pursuits to w T hich 
vou are devoted. Pleasure, honour, v/ealth, 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH SAFETY. 215 

may come and court your affections, and try to 
draw your heart away from your higher inter- 
ests ; but, if you have Joseph's spirit, you will 
meet them all with a resolute resistance ; and 
every conflict that occurs in your experience, 
will be the signal for a fresh victory. You 
will not do this in your own strength ; but 
God's gracious Spirit will come to your aid, 
and work in you and by you, to defeat the 
powers of evil. 

It is not merely from enemies without, however, 
that your best interests are in jeopardy — you 
have within you existing in connection with a 
partially sanctified nature, a formidable host of 
corruptions : and these continue to operate with 
more or less vigour to the close of life. But even 
these enemies shall not ultimately harm you. 
They may temporarily assert their power, and 
you may be ready sometimes to imagine that they 
will bring you into complete captivity. But here 
again, if you can rely on the testimony of God, 
you may feel sure that you will come off more 
than conqueror. The new principle in your soul 
will live in spite of them ; and every inward 
conflict in which you are engaged, will render it 



216 VmTUE I ED WITH SAFKTT. 

more vigorous in its operations. Yes, I repeat, 
you are safe ; because you have the promise of 
God — the everlasting arm, to sustain you. 

Say then, my young friends, whether there be 
not much implied in that safety which crowns a 
virtuous course, To be safe amidst temporal 
dangers and amidst spiritual dangers, from enemies 
without and from enemies within, in all actual 
and in all possible circumstances — surely you 
cannot estimate such a privilege too highly. The 
irreligious man is safe never, — not even when no 
cloud lowers in the sky, and every thing seems to 
speak of promise and hope : the good man is safe 
always, — though a death-like gloom may seem to 
have gathered over his horizon, and the last of his 
earthly joys may be upon the wing. Tirtue, thou 
art indeed rich in thy rewards — but as yet we 
have only seen the beginning. 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH PEACE, 217 



LETTER XVII. 

VIRTUE CROWNED WITH PEACE. 

It is a great blessing to live in peace with our 
fellow men j to be able to reflect, either that we 
have no enemies in the world, or that, if we have 
them, it is not our own fault. Peace in the 
domestic circle — peace in the neighbourhood — 
peace in the more extended community, — while 
it is in itself a rich blessing, is the source of many- 
other blessings which enter largely into the scene 
of human enjoyment. The universal prevalence 
of peace in the world is predicted in scripture as 
one of the brightest glories of Messiah's reign. 

But the peace of which 1 propose to treat in 
the present letter, differs from this chiefly as a 
cause differs from an effect. It is the inward 
peace of the soul — that serene and yet fearless 
state of mind, which philosophy indeed may 
counterfeit, but which Christianity alone can 
really produce. Let this spirit prevail through 

13 



218 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH PEACE. 

an entire community, and the members of that 
community will be at peace with each other, 
furnishing a beautiful resemblance to the harmony 
of Heaven. Let it reign in the breast of a solitary 
individual, and though there may be the wildest 
tempest raging around him, it will never penetrate 
the sanctuary of his own bosom. 

How beautifully is this inward peace exemplified 
in the history which I have laid before you ! We 
have seen that Joseph was sometimes placed in 
circumstances of peculiar trial : he was cruelly 
exiled from the paternal home ; he was sold as a 
slave ; he was imprisoned as a felon ; and yet 
there is not an intimation in the history, that he 
manifested the semblance of a complaining spirit 
in any of the trying situations in which he was 
placed ; and the only instance in which we hear 
of his making an effort, or saying a word, with a 
view to bring about any melioration of his condi- 
tion, was that in which he hinted to the king's 
butler, whose dream he had interpreted, that, after 
he (the butler) should be released from prison, a 
good word spoken to the king in his behalf, would 
be very acceptable. But there was no evidence 
that Joseph was ruffled by the ingratitude of his 



VIRTUE CROWXED WITH PEACE. 219 

fellow prisoner in not heeding his request j nor, 
indeed, by any other of the adverse circumstances 
which occurred to him. He seems always to have 
maintained a delightful equanimity of temper, — 
no matter what burdens may have oppressed, or 
what dangers may have threatened ; and this was 
at once one of the exercises and the rewards of his 
exemplary virtue. 

Let me call your attention, for a little, to the 
manner in which virtue — religion — operates to 
produce this inward peace. I hardly need say 
that this is a point of great importance ; for not 
only is this peace an important element in our 
earthly happiness, but it is that emphatically 
which constitutes earthly happiness. Without it, 
all the good which the world has to bestow, will 
leave a man miserable : with it, all the evil which 
the world can inflict, cannot render him so. In 
the strong language of scripture, it is a K peace 
that passeth understanding." 

Let me say then, that virtue operates to secure 
this richest of all blessings, first of all, by its 
effect upon the conscience. Man, as a sinner, is 
alienated from God, his righteous lawgiver and 
final judge ; and conscience is the faculty that 



220 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH PEACE. 

gives him notice of this alienation, and forces upon 
him the inquiry how he shall be able to stand in 
the judgment. He may indeed be so sunk in 
stupidity, that he may sin for a time, and even 
with a high hand, without remorse ; but let him 
awake to the actual reality of his condition, and 
then begins the controversy between his inclina- 
tions on the one hand, and his conscience on the 
other. His sinful propensities prompt to evil — 
his conscience points to a future reckoning ; and 
though, so long as he retains his character as an 
habitual sinner, his evil propensities prevail, yet, 
so long as his conscience remains in any degree 
awake, it will at least occasion an inward disquiet- 
ude, if it does not haunt him with absolute horror. 
Now, it is the province of true virtue to bring 
these different faculties of our nature into harmony 
— to give the inclinations a right direction, and 
to draw from conscience an approving testimony. 
But the difficulty lies yet deeper, and reaches 
farther back ; for even the renovating work of 
the Holy Spirit leaves man in only a partially 
sanctified state — he is still, in a degree, the 
servant of sin ; and conscience notifies him that 
every sin of which he is guilty deserves punish- 



i 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH PEACE. 221 

ment — notifies him, moreover, that he can do 
nothing to atone for the sins that are past. But 
here comes in the life giving assurance, that there 
is redemption from sin through the blood of Christ. 
Faith in Christ applies this blood to the con- 
science, thus furnishing it with an answer toward 
God; and the consequence is, that the clamours 
of guilt are hushed, and the joy which the 
confidence of a free forgiveness inspires, diffuses 
itself through the soul. Many of you, I trust, 
who will read these pages, have a knowledge on 
this subject, which experience alone can impart. 
You have felt — still feel — what no language 
can render intelligible to a mind that is a stranger 
to the exercises of living faith : and as for those 
who have had no such experience, they have not 
only the testimony of multitudes that is worthy 
of all acceptation, but they may form some 
conception of the joy of forgiveness by what they 
themselves sometimes suffer from the terrours 
of remorse. If you cannot fully appreciate the 
blessing of a pacified conscience through the 
blood of Christ, so far as respects its positive 
character, you surely have had experience enough 



222 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH PEACE. 

of an opposite kind, to realize that it is no light 
thing to gain a deliverance from a sense of guilt. 
But, while virtue produces inward peace, by 
thus reversing the testimony of conscience, it 
contributes to the same result also, by rooting out 
from the soul those evil affections and desires 
which perpetually minister to its disquietude. 
Look at the revengeful man. He has received, 
or supposes he has received, some injury; and 
he imagines that his honour is tarnished ; and 
he cannot rest till he has made provision to 
brighten it up by some revengeful act — perhaps 
by attacking his adversary in the street — perhaps 
-by calling him into the field, in the hope of 
shedding his blood. Rely on it, there is, in all 
.these cases, not only mental excitement but 
mental agony; the spirit which can prompt to 
such an act or such a project, is worthy of a 
fiend ; and it cannot have possession of a human 
bosom without being a tormentor. And even, 
where, from considerations of timidity or of 
policy, there may be no external demonstration 
of the revengeful spirit, — though it may never 
be felt in any offensive act, nor heard even in a 
whisper, yet it will be nothing better in the soul 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH PEACE. 223 

than an imprisoned fury ; or, if you please, a 
serpent holding the whole inner man continually 
in his deadly coils. Look, next, at the covetous 
man, who is forever grasping for great posses- 
sions ; at the envious man, who cannot be happy 
while he sees others more favoured than himself; 
at the complaining man, who can never be 
satisfied with his own lot ; at the sensualist, 
whose appetites are always in a feverish excite- 
ment, and whether gratified or ungratified, leave 
him with no rest to his spirit ; and, in each of 
these cases, if you could know the secret history 
of the soul, you would know that there is an 
amount of unhappiness, of which the outer 
man gives but little indication. To all these 
evils, virtue, in proportion as she prevails, fur- 
nishes an effectual antidote : and how much such 
an antidote is worth, .they best can judge, who 
have felt the corroding influence of these evil 
tempers, and have afterwards had them cured by 
those powerful influences from on high which 
religion supplies. 

It is not, however, the whole triumph of virtue 
that she eradicates bad dispositions — she brings 
goods ones in their place. She not only drives out 



224 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH PEACE. 

from the bosom the spirit of revenge, but she 
introduces the spirit of forgiveness and benevo- 
lence. She not only casts out the spirit of envy 
and repining, but she brings in generosity and 
contentment. She not only cures the vices of the 
sensualist, but, by bringing his appetites into a 
healthful subjection to his reason, she ministers to 
his direct and innocent enjoyment. Indeed, all 
the various emotions which virtue awakens, are in 
their nature pleasurable. Let her have the entire 
dominion of the soul, and you have the model of 
a Heaven upon earth. 

I may say too, that virtue opens yet another 
source of enjoyment, in the sweet hopes and 
anticipations which she inspires. It is not in 
man, constituted as he is, to be always absorbed 
with the present — the mind will run forward, to 
see what the future may have treasured up for it ; 
and no small part of its happiness or misery is 
found in the result of these excursions into futurity. 
The wicked man, if he exercises his faculties on 
this subject in a rational manner, will find nothing 
to minister to his joy — much, on the contrary, to 
fill him with anxiety and alarm. But the truly 
good man gathers from his anticipations of the 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH PEACE. 225 

future some of his most substantial and elevated 
enjoyment. What may await him in this world, 
he knows not — for aught that he can tell, his 
whole future life may be a scene of painful 
vicissitude; but there is another thought that 
more than sustains him under this — viz. that 
God's paternal care and faithfulness are pledged 
to him in all circumstances, and that nothing can 
occur, so adverse to his present comfort, but that 
it will serve to increase his future joy. And then, 
when he looks beyond this momentary existence, 
and throws his thoughts along the eternal future, 
here there rise to his view scenes of light and 
glory, which the most glowing imagination cannot 
fully overtake. Heaven, free from every thing 
that can awaken sorrow — Heaven, full of every 
thing that can entrance the spirit, opens upon the 
eye of faith ; and while he is employed in analy- 
zing the eternal weight of glory, his mind is 
quickened into a still higher exultation by the 
thought that this is his own glorious inheritance. 
What matters it how much of trouble there may 
be in my path through the world, if I have the 
assurance that that path shall open into a world 
whose glories will cast into the shade even the 



226 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH PEACE. 

brightest forms of life and beauty that my imagi- 
nation hath ever conceived. 

I must not omit to add that the good man is at 
peace, inasmuch as he enjoys the special presence 
and favour of God. He has a right to expect 
this at all times, provided he lives in the faithful 
discharge of duty; but especially in those dark 
seasons of life, when earthly comforts fail, and he 
has the deepest sense of the poverty of the world. 
Above all, has he a right to expect it, when the 
earthly tabernacle totters, and the grave is opening 
beneath his feet. Believe me, . the Lord our 
Shepherd does not forget his people, when they 
walk through the dark valley. As truly as they 
are there, He is there also, with his rod and his 
staff Oh, is not this a glorious reward of a 
virtuous life ? Is it not more than a compensation 
for all the toils and struggles which it may have 
occasioned, that it should render the last struggle 
easy to be borne, inasmuch as it is endured within 
sight of the world of glory— within hearing of 
the songs of seraphs ? 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH RICHES. 227 



LETTER XVIII. 

VIRTUE CROWNED WITH RICHES. 

You may perhaps think it a somewhat violent 
transition, to pass from a consideration of that 
inward peace which is so immediately identified 
with the happiness of the good man, and which is 
the germ of that more expanded and elevated 
enjoyment that he anticipates in Heaven, to a sub- 
ject that seems so earthly and grovelling as that of 
riches. You may be ready to ask whether I have 
forgotten that riches are alike uncertain and 
unsatisfying; that, while they often take to 
themselves wings and fly away, they are inade- 
quate, while they are possessed, to meet the 
soul's noblest desires — nay, that they drown 
multitudes in destruction and perdition. No, I 
have not forgotten this, or any part of it ; and yet 
I am prepared to maintain that riches may, in 
themselves, justly be considered a blessing ; for 
it is the province of virtue to transmute the 



228 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH RICHES. 

earthly into the heavenly — the perishable into 
the imperishable. Nay further, I am ready also 
to vindicate the joining together in the same 
category the wealth that palls and perishes and 
the peace that satisfies and endures ; for wealth 
has only to be used for the purposes for which it 
was intended, to become an auxiliary to that 
inward quietude which constitutes the soul's 
richest possession. In one point of view, you 
cannot say too much derogatory of riches — in 
another, you are in little danger of over-rating 
their value. Considered as the supreme portion 
of the soul, they are stamped with insignificance 
and worthlessness ; but, considered as a means of 
doing good and thus securing treasure in Heaven, 
they possess a value which outruns all human 
powers of calculation. 

You have already seen that Joseph, in the 
course of events, became the possessor of great 
riches. And how did he obtain them? Not 
surely by dishonest or even doubtful speculations, 
nor by any questionable means which, for his own 
credit's sake, he would have chosen not have 
divulged ; but simply by fulfilling with fidelity 
the duties belonging to the various stations in 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH RICHES. 229 

which Providence placed him. There is not the 
shadow of evidence from the history, that he was 
inordinately fond of riches, or that he yielded to 
any of the temptations which riches bring with 
them, or even that he ever made any special effort 
to obtain them ; but it was the ordinance of 
Heaven that, without his own seeking, he should 
have the control of great wealth. That it was 
really a great blessing to him, because he used it 
in such a manner as to be a blessing to others, 
there can be no doubt. 

Wealth is altogether a relative term ; as we 
denominate a man rich or poor, according to the 
standard by which he is judged. We, however, 
ordinarily consider a man rich, who has consider- 
able means at his command above what he needs 
for the support of himself and his family. If an 
individual has an income that barely supports him, 
and that with rigid economy, the utmost we say 
of him is, that he is in a state of respectable 
mediocrity ; but, if his income be so great that the 
reasonable expenses of himself and those who are 
immediately dependant upon him, consume but an 
inconsiderable part of it, then, by common consent, 
he is regarded a rich man. 



2B0 VIRTUE CR0WXED WITH RICHES. 

It has sometimes been questioned whether wealth 
is a legitimate object of human pursuit ; but, under 
certain limitations. I marvel that any one should 
ever doubt that it is so. As a means of nourishing 
extravagance, of gratifying pride, or of ruining 
chiidrenj no sober man would defend the pursuit 
of it ; but, as a means of ministering to the wants 
of others, of advancing the great interests of man- 
kind, and thus securing the blessing that rests 
upon the charitable, it may be pursued even 
diligently and earnestly, and neither reason nor 
religion will have any thing to say but in the way 
of approval. It is the spirit with which, and the 
end for which, it is pursued, that justify— I may 
say, sanctify the pursuit. 

Having- thus vindicated wealth from the charge 
of worthlessness, and the proper pursuit of it from 
the suspicion of criminality or unreasonableness, 
let me now attempt to show you that the practice 
of virtue is favourable to acquiring and retaining 
this world's goods. "When I speak of retaining 
them, of course I do not refer to their being kept 
in the hand of a miser, but to their being preserved 
from a premature and calamitous dispersion. 

Wealth is ordinarily the fruit of labour, either 



VTRTtTE CROWNED WITH RICHES. 231 

of body or mind, or both ; for successful labour, 
health is an essential requisite ; virtue is friendly 
to health, and therefore is favourable to the 
attainment of riches. Do you ask how virtue 
promotes health ? It promotes it by preventing 
that numerous tribe of diseases consequent on 
sensuality, which benumb the physical faculties, 
becloud the intellect, and brutalize the whole 
man. And even, when sensual indulgences are 
kept within what may be called a moderate limit, 
so that the individual shall not be marked for 
excess, still their effect is gradually to impair the 
energies of the system, as well as to render it 
unfit for immediate exertion. It promotes it still 
farther, by keeping the mind free, in a great 
measure, from agitating and corroding passions. 
Let an individual be subjected habitually to the 
goadings of a guilty conscience ; let him accustom 
himself to violent ebullitions of anger without any 
attempt at self control ; let him meet some morti- 
fication at every step by reason of his unsubdued 
pride ; let the sight of a condition more eligible 
than his own be a signal for the workings of a 
hateful envy ; and you may rest assured there is a 
process, however imperceptible, going forward, to 



232 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH RICHES. 

impair, if not ultimately destroy, his physical 
energies. God has constituted the different parts 
of our nature with such a dependance on each 
other, that, under the influence of the same causes, 
they are found to rejoice or to suffer together; 
and especially is it true that a wound which has 
its seat in the moral, extends, in a degree at least, 
both to the intellectual and the physical. Whereas, 
on the other hand, let the moral faculties receive 
that direction which virtue secures to them ; let 
the conscience bear witness for good, and let the 
passions occupy their proper place as servants, 
not as masters, in the soul, and you may rely on 
it that much has been gained towards securing an 
unclouded, vigorous mind, and a healthful body. 
I do not undertake to say that every good man is, 
of course, a man of active intellect, or of robust 
bodily health ; and, on the other hand, I am well 
aware that some monsters in vice have possessed 
and retained, not only gigantic powers of mind, 
but uninterrupted health of body, through a long 
life. But these latter cases especially, are evi- 
dently exceptions to a general rule ; and are to 
be accounted for, sometimes from some peculiarity 
of original constitution, and sometimes from the 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH RICHES. 233 

overpowering influence of circumstances. The 
ordinary course of human experience fully con- 
firms my position, that a well balanced state of 
the affections and passions, which it is the appro- 
priate office of virtue to bring about, is highly 
favourable to that state of both mind and body 
which is essential to continued and successful 
effort 

I am sure you will not think I have taken too 
much for granted in saying that health is an abso- 
lute requisite to effective labour ; for no doubt 
your own experience has already taught you some 
lessons on this subject which you cannot forget. 
Suppose your occupation be that of a merchant, 
or a mechanic, or a farmer ; and you go to your 
counting-room, or to your work-shop, or upon 
your farm, with an enervated, or perhaps inflamed, 
physical system : you look around you and see 
that there is much to be done ; and, it may be, 
actually put your hand to the work ; but, in the 
weakness that oppresses, or the fever that burns, 
or the pain that agonizes, you find a reason for 
speedily returning to your dwelling, and possibly 
sending for medical aid. Or, it may be, you are 
engaged in one of the liberal professions, or per- 

13* 



234 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH RICHES. 

haps have devoted yourself to literature and 
authorship — here again, you go with an enfeebled 
frame into your office or study, and gird yourself 
for a conflict with some knotty point in the law, 
or set yourself to ponder and digest some of the 
fine passages from the ancient classics — but oh 
how inadequate you are to the work you have 
undertaken, and how glad you are to get back to 
your chamber, where you can sink down into an 
attitude of comfortable repose ! And the saddest 
illustration of this point is, that labour persevered 
in, in spite of disease, not unfrequently brings 
death. Not a year passes but that numbers many 
a youthful genius among the dead, who, but for 
acting in defiance of the laws of his physical 
constitution, might have continued to shine for 
years with increasing brilliancy. 

Virtue tends to the same result also, by prompt- 
ing to a habit of industry. Without such a habit, 
no one can ever expect to .acquire wealth, unless, 
by some fortunate accident, it may be thrown into 
his possession ; nor, in the ordinary course of 
things, will one be likely to retain it long, if he 
actually does possess it. For where there is not 
industry, you will rarely find economy : indolence 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH RICHES, 235 

and prodigality usually go hand in hand ; and it 
matters not how much property may be committed 
to such an agency as this, it will almost certainly, 
at no distant period, go to the winds. But, on 
the contrary, an industrious habit will usually be 
found associated with an economical habit ; and 
the man whose faculties are kept in vigorous 
operation for the attainment of any object, frill 
be likely to take good care that the object does 
not needlessly slip through his hands. But how 
does it appear that it is the tendency of virtue to 
make one industrious ? She teaches every man 
that those faculties which qualify him for action, 
are the gift of his Creator, and that, as a re- 
sponsible agent, he is bound to use them fur the 
purposes for which they are given. She teaches 
him that the sphere of his activity is designated 
by the circumstances in which he is placed : and 
that, if he is called to labour in a worldly 
vocation, he is to labour diligently, with a view 
to the accomplishment of the greatest good. And 
finally, by the influence that she exerts in pro- 
ducing and preserving a healthful state of the 
faculties, she not only increases the ability to 
labour, but renders labour pleasant : so that 



236 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH RICHES. 

industry carries with it its own reward. If then 
wealth is ordinarily to be expected only from 
industry, and industry is the legitimate product 
of virtue, we have a right to say that virtue is 
favourable to this kind of worldly prosperity. 

It is another important consideration which 
you are to note, that a virtuous character always 
secures public confidence ; and all men of busi- 
ness know how indispensable this is to successful 
enterprize. So numerous and complicated are 
the relations of business, that no one can go 
extensively into any department of it, without 
having much to do with his fellow men — without 
having frequent occasion to ask facilities of some 
kind or other in carrying forward his operations ; 
and sometimes momentous issues may be staked 
on his ability to obtain them. Now, if he have 
the confidence of the community, as he certainly 
will have if he be a truly good man, he will 
ordinarily find it no difficult matter to obtain 
whatever temporary assistance he may need ; nor 
will those to whom he makes application find 
occasion even to hesitate, or to make inquiry 
concerning him, before they determine to respond 
favourably to his request. And even in cases 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH RICHES. 23? 

where it may be inconvenient to render the 
desired assistance, there will not be wanting those 
who will be ready to make a special effort. 
and even subject themselves to some temporary 
embarrassment, rather than that such a man 
should suffer seriously and permanently in his 
worldly interests. You may rest assured that 
any man, — no matter how much distinguished 
for shrewdness and foresight he may be — if he 
has not the confidence of the community in which 
he lives, labours in any vocation at great disad- 
vantage ; whereas, on the other hand, a man of 
only moderate capacity for business, — if he has 
a high character for integrity and benevolence, 
will have every thing to hope from the good will 
of his neighbours and acquaintances. 

But there is one consideration more, which 
has a bearing on this subject, too important to be 
omitted — I mean that the good man, even in his 
worldly pursuits, has a right to expect the 
special blessing of God. It is of the man who 
" delighteth greatly in keeping the divine com- 
mandments," that inspiration hath said, that 
* wealth and riches shall be in his house." Not* 
withstanding there is an established order of 



238 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH RICHES. 

things in the kingdom both of nature and of provi- 
dence, yet this is not to be regarded as a piece 
of blind mechanism that moves forward without 
a mover or a guide ; nor yet as being fixed in 
such a sense that there is no room for the 
operation of infinite intelligence and infinite 
benevolence in connection with it : on the con- 
trary. He who originated it and put it in motion, 
presides over it, every moment ; and He is never 
at a loss how to make it the medium of the 
fulfilment of his promises, or of the communica- 
tion of his silent, though special blessing, on the 
labours of those who trust in him. 

After all, I think I hear you saying, " Is not 
the doctrine of this letter contradicted by common 
experience? When we look abroad upon the 
world, do we not find that a large proportion of 
the rich men are those who put no trust in God, 
and who scruple not even at the most questionable 
schemes for obtaining property ; and that a multi- 
tude of the poor are rich in faith and heirs of the 
kingdom ?" I reply to this, without altogether 
denying the fact implied in it, that, though the 
natural tendencies of things may sometimes be 
counteracted by the influence of circumstances. 



i 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH RICHES. 239 

yet they still remain the same ; and that we are 
to regulate our conduct and frame our expecta- 
tions according to the established order of thing's, 
and not according to any devices which may 
seem to contradict it. And further, if it be 
admitted, as doubtless it must, that men may 
become very rich by very unfair means, experi- 
ence also teaches, and with no less certainty, that 
property acquired in this way, does not ordinarily 
remain long in the hands of its possessor. A 
dishonest man, though he may occasionally 
succeed in outwitting others, is almost sure, 
sooner or later, to play the same game success- 
fully on himself. The treasures of such an one 
are liable to be taken up by every wind ; and if 
they are suffered to remain with him, it will be 
found at last that there was a 'concealed canker 
lodged in them. Here is the true reason, in 
respect to multitudes, why they are suddenly 
plunged from affluence to poverty — their posses- 
sions were fraudulently procured ; and God in 
judgment permits them to be quickly dissipated. 
Let all your efforts, my young friends, for the 
acquisition of property, be prompted and directed 
by virtuous dispositions ; and you have reason to 



240 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH HONOUR. 

expect that God will crown them with his bless- 
ing; or, if he send disappointment, it will be 
your privilege to know that there is a blessing 
even in that. 



LETTER XIX. 

VIRTUE CROWNED WITH HONOUR. 

Every one who reads the history of Joseph 
perceives at once the connection between the 
high character which he maintained and the high 
places which he occupied. He might have 
possessed fine intellectual powers, and those 
powers might have been extensively cultivated, 
and yet it is by no means certain that he would 
ever have emerged from the degrading bondage 
into which his brethren sold him. Neither 
Potiphar nor Pharaoh would have entrusted him 
with so much authority, but for the confidence 
which they felt that he would not abuse it ; and 
this confidence was founded upon a full convic- 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH. HONOUR. 241 

tion of his spotless integrity. Need I say that 
this is but an illustration of the truth which I 
design to spread before you in this letter — viz. 
that virtue naturally tends to honour. I use the 
word honour here in two different senses — as 
denoting the esteem that is generally paid to true 
worth, and the distinction that pertains to exalted 
rank. 

The best evidence that virtue tends to secure 
the favourable regards of mankind, is to be found 
in what we see constantly passing around us. 
Who are the individuals who enjoy in the highest 
degree the confidence of the community in which 
they live ; whose example is most frequently held 
up as worthy of all praise ; whose death makes a 
chasm in society that is sensibly felt and deeply 
deplored ? And, on the other hand, who are they 
that are looked upon with suspicion, and are 
trusted, if trusted at all, only within very narrow 
limits; whose example is referred to only as a 
thing to be shunned, and whose death is regarded 
as relieving society from an incubus, if not from 
a pest ? Each of these questions suggests its own 
answer. He who should require any other proof 
that virtue secures esteem than what meets hk& 

14 



242 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH HONOUR. 

wherever his eye rests, is either a miserable hypo- 
crite, or else is not to be dealt with as a rational 
being. 

But what I am concerned to do now, is to show 
you how virtue secures this end. And even this 
is so obvious that it cannot require any lengthened 
train of remark. 

It results from the very constitution of our 
nature, that we approve of virtue both in the 
principle and the practice. Its leading elements 
are integrity and benevolence ; and, though it 
must be admitted that men may become so des- 
perately corrupt, as to hate these qualities, at least 
in some of their operations, yet they have, after 
all, a principle within them, which renders a 
verdict, constrained though it be, in favour of the 
right : or, if there be some cases in which deprav- 
ity is so gross as to bring a film temporarily over 
the eye of the soul, so that the difference between 
good and evil is really not discovered, yet that 
film sooner or later passes off, and the moral 
perceptions finally become as distinct as ever. 
Even the operation of justice, which belongs 
essentially to virtue, finds an advocate in the 
bosom of the very man whose voice is lifted up 






VIRTUE CROWDED WITH HONOUR. 243 

to protest against it. The knave who is arraigned 
to answer for his fraudulent transactions, the 
thief who looks forward to his trial as an intro- 
duction to the penitentiary, the assassin who has 
visions of the ignominy and horrour of the scaf- 
fold, — however much each of them may attempt 
to prove his innocence of the crime with which he 
is charged, he will never think of maintaining that 
that with which he is charged is no crime ; and, 
in his silent communings with himself, he will be 
obliged to admit to his own conscience that the 
magistrate did right when he arrested him, and 
that the court will do right when they sentence 
him. The truth is, though it is at the option 
of men to do right or wrong, it is no easy thing 
for them, especially in cases of moment, to confound 
the right and the wrong in their perceptions. And 
if this be true even in extreme cases, it proves 
beyond a peradventure, that there is that in the 
very constitution of man, that renders homage to 
virtue, antecedently even to the blessings which 
virtue brings in its train. 

But we are to look at it further, as it operates 
for the well being of society. What are those 
evils which have the most disastrous bearing upon 



244 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH HONOUR, 

social happiness? What but the indulgence of 
the base and malignant passions of human nature? 
What but that devotion to sensual gratification 
that robs man of his humanity ? What but that 
malicious and revengeful spirit that, in resenting 
one injury, provokes another? What but that cold 
and withering selfishness, that can look upon 
suffering with an unpitying eye, and even refuse a 
morsel of bread to the forlorn and pennyless 
orphan ? But, just in proportion as virtue pre- 
vails in a community, these evils are prevented or 
removed. Virtue saves the expense of sustaining 
alms-houses and penitentiaries, and prevents the 
disgrace and suffering incident to a residence in 
these dwelling places of the guilty. Virtue exerts 
herself to reclaim those who have begun to wan- 
der, and thus to check vice in its incipient stages. 
Virtue carries bread to the starving poor; and 
builds hospitals for the sick ; and gathers the 
children of profligate and outcast parents into 
places of instruction ; and erects barriers strong 
and high against the progress of evil. Virtue 
Boftens whatever is rugged in the human character ; 
secures to civil government the ends which it con- 
templates as a benevolent ministry: and diffuses 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH HONOUR. 245 

an inexpressible charm over the face of society. 
And who is not interested in the social improve- 
ment and elevation of the community in which 
he lives? If you can tell me who, I will tell 
you who they are with whom a virtuous life will 
not be accounted a recommendation. 

But there is a yet more particular influence 
which virtue exerts to secure the good will of 
mankind — I mean the influence of particular 
acts of beneficence in awakening the gratitude 
of those who are the objects of them. We vene- 
rate the man who stands forth a great publick 
benefactor, even though we may have no other 
interest in^his benefaction than has every member 
of the community to which we belong. But let 
the favour that is bestowed assume a personal 
character toward ourselves — and the individual 
who bestows it becomes more directly an object 
of our gratitude. A large portion of the deeds 
of a virtuous man are deeds of benevolence, 
designed to elevate the character or meliorate 
the condition of individuals within the circle of 
his influence. And do you not think that each 
of these, if he have the common feelings of a 
man, will find those feelings quickened into 



246 Virtue crowned with honour. 

grateful exercise, on being the recipient of the 
good man's favours ? Will not the poor family 
to whom he sends a portion from his own table, 
bless him for having remembered them ? Will 
not the child whom his charity rescues from the 
degradation of the parental home, or perhaps 
from an incipient career of vagrancy and crime, 
and elevates first to decency and comfort, and 
afterwards to respectability and usefulness — will 
not that child, I ask, to his dying hour, have 
feelings of thankfulness toward his benefactor 
which the tongue cannot utter? And will not 
every one who associates with such a person, — 
whether superior, inferior, or equal, — receive 
from him, in the ordinary intercourse of life, 
some expressions of kindness, which will find a 
permanent lodgment not only in the memory, but 
in the heart? It is delightful to a virtuous 
man to reflect that his general character com- 
mands the good will and esteem of his fellow 
men ; but methinks he finds a source of still 
higher happiness, in the grateful acknowledgments 
that pour upon him from those, to whom he has 
been a personal benefactor. 

It particularly deserves your consideration that 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH HONOUR. 247 

bad men as well as good, render their homage to 
virtue ; — sometimes when they are, and sometimes 
when they are not, conscious of doing so. Why 
is it that the profane man, who, in ordinary 
circumstances, incorporates an oath with every 
sentence, and who, when reproved for doing so, 
pleads that habit has rendered him unconscious 
of it — why is it that, in the presence of a man 
of acknowledged and exalted virtue, he can talk 
without making his usual display of the rhetoric 
of curses ? It is because the majesty of virtue 
overawes him ; and he is constrained to appear 
reverent in her presence. Why is it that the 
wretch who has the hardihood to traduce and 
revile the godly, is sure to represent the good 
which he would vilify under the aspect of evil — 
to call conscientiousness, pusillanimity ; and 
devotion, hypocrisy ; and charity, ostentation ; 
and zeal, fanaticism? It is for no other reason 
than that he knows that the virtues which he 
affects to contemn, are noble and praiseworthy ; 
and that, unless he can pass them off as vices, he 
cannot hope that his ridicule will catch the ear 
even of the vicious themselves. And I may add, 
why is it that men of depraved characters do not 



248 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH HONOUR. 

select their own associates in wickedness to 
discharge for them important and responsible 
trusts, but that, on the contrary, they are just as 
careful to inquire into the moral character of the 
individuals to whom they wish to confide their 
concerns, as any other persons in the community ? 
Especially how comes it to pass, as it often has 
done, that infidels who have professedly gloried 
in their rejection of Christianity, have committed 
their children to the care and instruction of men 
of exemplary piety ? And to refer to a particular 
case, how happened it that one of the most scof- 
fing infidels whom this country has ever known, 
when asked by his daughter on her death-bed, 
whether he would have her, in that trying hour, 
believe as he had taught her, or as she had been 
taught by her pious mother — how happened it, 
I ask, that the infidel father melted into tears, 
and exclaimed with a faltering voice, " Believe 
as your mother has taught you!" There is but 
one answer to these questions — it is, in every 
case, the involuntary homage which the soul even 
of a bad man renders to true virtue. These cases 
show that there is not a little hypocrisy even in 
the most blustering infidelity ; and that the worst 



vtelttc: crowned with honour. 249 

of men, in trying times, are glad to come under 
the protection, even though they may not enlist 
under the banner, of Christianity. 

It must be acknowledged that honour, when 
considered as indicating the distinction that 
belongs to rank or office, is, by no means 
uniformly, or even very frequently, the reward 
of a virtuous course ; nor is mere virtue, apart 
from intelligence, entitled to such distinction. 
An individual may be a pattern of all that is 
amiable and praiseworthy in his social relations, 
and may even be distinguished for his exhibition 
of the Christian graces, and yet, for want of 
sufficient vigour of mind, or of the due cultivation 
of his powers, he may be utterly unfit to wield 
the influences which belong to an exalted station. 
But, even admitting that virtue is associated with 
intelligence, and with all the other requisite 
qualifications for being clothed with civil author- 
ity, it will depend, after all, especially under 
such a government as ours, on the moral state of 
the community, whether it shall find the exaltation 
which it deserves. It is a lamentable fact, which 
our experience as a nation forbids us to doubt, 
that party spirit may invest weakness and corrup- 



250 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH HONOUR. 

tion with high authority, and leave the most 
exalted virtue, even when associated with the 
most exalted intelligence, to the obscurity of a 
private station. But let virtue in a community 
become triumphant, — let the publick conscience 
be suitably enlightened, and the publick morals 
duly elevated. — and the wise and good will no 
longer be suffered to remain in obscurity : even 
though their modesty should court retirement, the 
suffrages of their fellow citizens will bring them 
forth, and elevate them to places of trust and 
influence. Nay, it will sometimes happen that 
men of this character will be exalted to high 
places, in a community that is deeply corrupt ; 
for, as one bad man is not usually disposed to 
confide his most important personal interests to 
another bad man, so a community which vice has 
essentially corrupted, may, from purely selfish 
considerations, prefer to trust its interests with 
men of integrity and wisdom. This principle 
will be found to operate especially in respect to 
subordinate offices, which it is left to the discre- 
tion of the superior in authority to fill ; for, while 
there is here less room for party spirit to operate, 
the things chiefly regarded are the ability and 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH HONOUR. 251 

fidelity with which the duties of the office will 
probably be discharged. 

The conclusion of the whole matter is, that, in 
a virtuous community, good men, other things 
being equal, are the fairest candidates for the high 
places of trust; — indeed, they are the only class 
who can aspire to such places with any hope of 
success : and, even in the most equivocal state of 
society, they will not unfrequently be elevated 
through the influence of mere publick selfishness. 
And as for bad men, — though they may occupy 
posts of honour, and may live amidst the splen- 
dours of rank and the incense of flattery, yet 
they can never personally become the objects of 
general esteem and regard. Be examples of true 
virtue, and you need have no fear but that the world 
will find it out, and will honour you for every 
noble quality with which your character is adorned. 
If you rise to an exalted station, it is well — you 
will be prepared to fill it with dignity and advan- 
tage : but if you spend your days in retirement, 
it is well also ; for there too virtue will weave for 
you a chaplet in the grateful regards and benedic- 
tions of your fellow creatures. 



252 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH USEFULNESS, 



LETTER XX. 

VIRTUE CROWNED WITH USEFULNESS. 

What a noble example of usefulness was Jo- 
seph in every relation which he sustained — in 
every condition in which he was placed! Of 
what he was to the Midianitish merchants, previ- 
ous to his being sold to Potiphar, we have no 
account ; but, from that period to the close of his 
life, the monuments of his benevolent activity are 
continually rising before us. It was the disposi- 
tion which he manifested to render himself useful, 
that caused him to be advanced in the house of 
Potiphar ; and there he was most heartily and zeal- 
ously devoted to his master's interests. During his 
confinement in prison, — though he was conscious 
that it was a most unjust and cruel confinement, — 
yet he was constantly occupied in some useful 
way ; and very soon was entrusted with the 
general oversight of all his fellow prisoners. 
And then when he became governour of the 



virtue crowned with usefulness. 253 

land — who can calculate the amount of good 
that he accomplished ? The single precaution 
that he took for saving the land of Egypt from, 
the threatening famine, was the means of averting 
an amount of distress which it is not easy to 
calculate; and not merely from the people of 
Egypt, but, as it turned out, from his own imme- 
diate family. All the publick concerns of the 
country he seems to have managed with the 
utmost skill and success ; and no doubt the 
period of his administration was unprecedented 
in respect to both publick and private happiness. 
But doubtless we must reckon his greatest useful- 
ness as connected with the immediate fortunes of 
his own house, and the remoter and higher interests 
of the church of God. We need not — perhaps 
we cannot — suppose that he was fully aware of 
the relation which he maintained to the church in 
all future ages ; of the vital importance of the 
agency which he was carrying forward, to the 
accomplishment of the grandest promise of Jeho- 
vah. It was enough for him that he was always 
faithfully and earnestly engaged in doing his 
duty. But to us it appears manifest that what he 
did, constituted an important link in the chain of 



254 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH USEFULNESS. 

causes and effects, "by which the triumph of God's 
mercy in the scheme of redemption is finally to 
be accomplished. 

What was true of Joseph is true of every other 
good man — his life is crowned with usefulness. 
Here again, for the truth of this remark, I refer 
you to your own observation. I will only ask 
your attention to a few thoughts illustrative of the 
manner in which virtue operates to secure this 
end. 

Let me say then, in the first place, virtue 
renders its possessor useful, by securing to his 
faculties their right direction and their legitimate 
exercise. The good man recognizes his obligation 
not only to exert the powers which God has 
given him, but to exert them for purposes of 
good ; and if he is tempted to pervert them to 
mere selfish gratification, even though no positive 
evil to his fellow men may be involved, he will 
find himself subjected to self-reproach from having 
neglected duly to consider his Creator's claims. 
And not only is his judgment on this subject 
suitably enlightened and convinced, but his heart 
goes along with his judgment ; and while he 
approves the right he also loves it. He engages 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH USEFULNESS. 255 

in doing good, therefore, in obedience not only to 
a command of God most clearly revealed, but 
also, if I may be allowed the expression, to one 
of the instincts of his renovated nature. And the 
same authority which enjoins this — the same 
temper that disposes to it, may be expected to 
secure the full amount of benevolent activity of 
which he is capable. Let a man know what God 
requires of him, and have the disposition to fulfil 
the requisition, and it is impossible to conceive 
that such a man should live either to do wrong 
or to do nothing. As this knowledge and this 
disposition are both included in true virtue, it is 
manifest that virtue is essentially the parent of 
usefulness. 

But while virtue keeps the faculties appropri- 
ately employed, she makes the most of all those 
opportunities for doing good which grow out of 
the various relations and conditions in life. Place 
her where you will, and she finds means of use- 
fulness, which she diligently and scrupulously 
improves. In the various occupations and profes- 
sions in which the mass of men look for nothing 
beyond their own aggrandizement, the truly good 
man finds channels innumerable through which 



256 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH tTSETULXESS. 

to send forth a healthful and quickening influ- 
ence on the neighbourhood, the community, the 
world. 

Virtue renders any station that is not in itself 
dishonourable, subservient to the publick good. 
Take, for instance, the military man — though 
his profession is so intimately associated with 
peril and death, and is often exercised in the face 
of honour and justice, yet who can doubt that it 
may be — ought to be — rendered tributary to 
the great interests of the human family i Napo- 
leon indeed exercised it in obedience to the 
dictates of a burning ambition — in his hands it 
was a frightful engine of wrath and wo — he was 
a man of one idea ; and that idea was the com- 
plete subjugation of the nations to his usurped 
authority. And though God may have over- 
ruled for good what he did. yet his mad and 
terrific movements were all directed by the spirit 
of evil. But how was it with our own Washing- 
ton? With him the military profession, being 
under the direction of virtue, became the instru- 
ment of national happiness and glory: — nay, it 
was a ministration of good to the whole human 
family, through all succeeding generations ; for 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH USEFULNESS. 257 

while it was the means of securing our nation's 
independence, it has spread, or is destined to 
spread, the savour of true liberty all over the 
world. No doubt Washington had, from the 
beginning, the most enlarged views of the enter- 
prize, and beheld in its success the triumph of a 
principle which is destined to work a mighty- 
change in the whole structure of human society ; 
but it may well be doubted whether even his far 
reaching eye overtook all the mighty results 
which less than half a century has developed. 
If, with his great military prowess, he had had 
Arnold's heart, or even the heart of many a man 
that is not disgraced before the world, where 
would have been this tree of liberty under whose 
shadow we repose, and the leaves of which are 
already beginning to operate for the healing of 
the nations? It may be that no other opportu- 
nity may occur to the end of time for rendering 
the military profession subservient to so important 
a purpose as was accomplished by Washington ; 
but there is not a soldier so insignificant, even 
during the prevalence of the most undisturbed 
peace, but that he may use his profession to 
purposes of good — if in no other way, at least 

14* 



258 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH USEFULNESS. 

in endeavouring to elevate the character of his 
military associates. 

Next, look at the man who occupies an 
important civil station, and see how much good 
may be accomplished by his well directed influ- 
ence. Our own history furnishes a galaxy of 
illustrious statesmen, any one of whom might be 
selected to illustrate the high usefulness which 
legitimately belongs to such a sphere. The 
virtuous statesman has his hand directly on the 
springs of the public weal. His voice is heard 
and heeded, where a thousand other voices might 
speak in vain. Perplexing questions are un- 
ravelled by his wisdom, and base projects are 
exposed and defeated by his integrity. And 
beside his publick influence, his official dignity 
gives additional consideration to his private acts 
— the legislator or the judge is so identified with 
the man, that the respect which attaches to the 
one, extends also to the other. An action per- 
formed by an obscure individual might awaken 
little attention and produce little effect ; when the 
same action performed by a man of exalted rank 
might exert an influence that would be felt 
through ail the pores of society. 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH USEFULNESS. 259 

The legal profession too opens a wide field 
of usefulness to the man of right views and 
dispositions. There is scarcely any thing in the 
organization of society, more intimately connected 
with its well being, than the legitimate operation 
of the law. In this world of injustice and 
injury, there should be some means of redress 
which may be relied on — some system of pro- 
cedure by which the weak may sustain themselves 
against the strong — the oppressed against the 
arrogant. Tins is just the relief which the law 
contemplates, and which, if lightly administered, 
it effectually secures. It is true indeed that there 
is no profession more capable than this of being 
perverted to purposes of evil; and, in the hands 
of multitudes, it is nothing better than the minis- 
ter of strife, not to say, the instrument of 
oppression: but, let an individual engage in it 
conscientiously, and with a sincere desire to 
witness the triumph of truth and justice rather 
than the triumph of his skill, — and his influence 
will diffuse itself most gratefully over the whole 
community; he will be regarded, and justly, as 
the friend of the injured; and, after he is dead, 
his name will not be forgotten, but multitudes will 



260 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH USEFULNESS. 

rise up to bear witness to his good deeds and hon- 
our him as a conscientious lawyer. 

The merchant also — especially the opulent 
merchant — can you measure the amount of good 
which he has it in his power to accomplish ? By 
his fair and honourable dealing, he may do much 
to elevate the general character of commercial 
intercourse ; by being a pattern of honesty and 
punctuality and general exactness in trade, he 
may do much to extend the same spirit and 
rebuke the opposite among his fellow merchants ; 
and thus society at large may reap the benefit of 
his example. But I chiefly refer here to the 
good uses which he may make of his wealth, in 
advancing the best interests of his fellow men. 
He may not only carry portions to the needy in 
his own neighbourhood, and thus cause the heart 
of many a widow to sing for joy, but he may 
make permanent provision for the relief of wretch- 
edness in various forms, which shall bring to him 
the blessing of multitudes who are ready to 
perish. If you inquire by whom our alms-houses 
and hospitals and lunatick asylums are chiefly 
endowed ; by whom the noble institutions for the 
promotion of learning scattered here and there 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH USEFULNESS. 261 

over the land, hare been founded ; by whom the 
largest contributions for the extension of the 
gospel in heathen lands have been made ; I greatly 
mistake if you do not find that the brightest names 
on these lists of the world's benefactors are mer- 
chants — that no small part of the money that has 
been thus bestowed for the good of mankind, has 
been earned by diligently, if you please doggedly, 
buying and selling goods. 

I might, in the same way, go through with all 
the other professions and occupations in which 
men engage, which are in accordance with integ- 
rity and honour, and show you how each of them 
may be — under the direction of virtue, actually 
is — subservient to useful purposes. But I will 
only add that there is no condition so obscure — 
none even so wretched — but that it will open a 
field of usefulness to a good man. Suppose that 
he is so obscure that, though he is in your imme-. 
diate neighbourhood, you never hear of him — 
yet there are those who do know him, and to 
whom he has access in daily intercourse. These 
he can influence by his example, his conversation, 
perhaps by his prayers ; and it is by no means 
improbable that some will dwell in heaven forever, 



262 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH USEFULXSE5. 

because the}' have dwelt on earth within the circle 
of his influence. Or suppose that he is left to 
linger out years upon a sick bed, and is thereby 
cut off from all intercourse, except with those 
who come to sympathize in his affliction, or 
minister to his wants — even there he may be an 
eminently useful man. By his faith in God, his 
cheerful submission, his elevated devotion, he may 
leave an indelible impression for good on those 
who are about his bedside; and the story of what 
passes there may penetrate some other hearts to 
which it may be communicated ; and the prayers 
which he offers up may be the medium through 
which the richest blessings shall be conveyed to 
multitudes whom he has never seen. I repeat, it 
is the privilege of the good man to be useful 
always — he may be sick and poor, he may be 
unknown and forgotten, he may even be impris- 
oned and manacled, and yet, so long as he has 
lips that can move in prayer, or a heart that can 
beat to the spiritual miseries of the world, you 
may not say that he is a cumberer of the ground. 

What a delightful employment to reflect on a 
useful life, when life is drawing to a close ! How 
transported must have been the apostle, when he 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH HEAVEN. 269 

could say, M I have fought a good fight, I have 
finished my course, I have kept the faith I" You, 
my young friends, will soon be in his circum- 
stances, in respect to the opening of another world 
upon your spirits. Murmur not, though God place 
you in the humblest circumstances here ; but be 
thankful that, even in these circumstances, your 
consciences may at least bear testimony to a useful 
life. Let this blessed result be accomplished in 
your experience, and be your condition on earth 
what it may, you need not envy the rich man his 
wealth, nor the statesman his laurels, nor the 
monarch his crown. 



LETTER XXI. 

VIRTUE CROWNED WITH HEAVEN. 

You have seen that Joseph was an eminently 
religious man. His religious character embraced 
not merely the outward act but the inward prin- 
ciple. He was one of the patriarchs who " died 



264 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH HEAVEN. 

in faith not having received the promises, but 
having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of 
them, and embraced them, and confessed that they 
were strangers and pilgrims on the earth ;" foi 
whom God " hath prepared a city." His life had 
been one of singular vicissitude — multiplied 
blessings were mingled with multiplied trials ; — 
but the period at length came, when that " better 
country, that is, an heavenly," which had so long 
been the object of his desire, and for which it had 
been the great business of his life to prepare, rose 
upon his delighted eye, perhaps while he was yet 
among the clouds and mists that hang about the 
valley of death, What a moment of ecstacy was 
that, in which he was permitted to feel that the 
work of his life was fully accomplished, that its 
cares and toils and calamities were all over, and 
that he was in the act of entering on that " rest" 
which " remain eth for the people of God 1" 
Here we reach the crowning part of Joseph's 
reward. He had indeed experienced many bless- 
ings, in consequence of his integrity and piety, 
while he was on earth ; — the blessing of a good 
reputation, of inward peace, of great worldly 
prosperity; but here is something that casts all 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH HEAVEN. 265 

previous blessings into the shade — knowledge 
without perplexing doubts ; joy without an alloy 
of grief; life without even the fear of death. 
Who would not desire to be like Joseph in his 
end? Who would not account all earthly suffer- 
ings light, if they might be followed with the 
crown that fadeth not away? 

You, my young friends, especially if you are 
living under the power of a practical Christianity, 
have already experienced — are daily experiencing 
— many rich blessings, which make a powerful 
claim upon your gratitude ; but the present com- 
pared with the future is like the faintest gleam of 
the morning to the sun shining in his strength, 
Heaven — Heaven is the great object, upon which 
you are to fasten your regards and your hopes ; 
for it is not more certain that you have the prin- 
ciple of true religion in your hearts, than that the 
glories of that better world are made sure to you. 

You observe that I speak of Heaven as the 
ultimate reward of a good man ; but to those of 
you who are entitled, in view of your present 
character, to expect this reward, I surely need 
not say that it does not come to you in conse- 
quence of your own deservings. It is indeed a 

Id 



266 VIHTTJE CROWNED WITH HEAVEN. 

purchased possession ; but it has been purchased 
by the blood of Christ; and it comes to you as 
a free gift. But though purchased — though free, 
it can never become yours, independently of a 
compliance with the terms on which it is offered : 
it is the completion of your salvation ; and salva- 
tion is bestowed only on them who exercise 
repentance toward God and faith in the Lord 
Jesus Christ. Moreover, Heaven is not the same 
to all its glorified inhabitants. Its felicities are 
measured out according to the character which 
each individual has had during the period of his 
pilgrimage. As one star differeth from another 
star in glory in the natural firmament, so there 
will be a corresponding diversity in the firmament 
of glorified intelligences. Notwithstanding it is 
by the grace of God that the feeblest saint who is 
but scarcely saved, has his place in the world of 
glory, yet each one will receive according to that 
he hath done, as if the reward were adjudged 
according to the actual degrees of merit. The 
word of God fully justifies us in reckoning Heaven 
as a reward ; but it is a reward not of debt, but 
of grace. While it marks the measure of Chris- 
tian attainment, it is a testimony to the strength 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH HEAVEN^ 267 

of divine love and the efficacy of Christ's me- 
diation. 

But what is Heaven ? Who can adequately 
answer this question % Inspiration, in the attempt 
to describe it, hath gathered images of beauty and 
grandeur from every part of the creation ; and yet 
perhaps the highest idea of Heaven that it has 
conveyed to us, is in such passages as these — 
"Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither 
have entered into the heart of man the things 
which God hath prepared for them that love 
him." M It doth not yet appear what we shall 
be: but we know that when he shall appear, 
we shall be like him ; for we shall see him as he 
is." If even the pen of inspiration falters in the 
attempt to produce a sketch of the city of our 
God — the new Jerusalem, — how poor and frigid 
must be any thing that mortals can say, compared 
with the glorious reality ! 

As the language of scripture, intended to 
describe the glory of the heavenly state, is 
necessarily in a great degree figurative, in order 
that it may be accommodated to our feeble 
comprehension, it were rash for us to attempt 
to decide with confidence on the meaning of at 



268 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH HEAVEN. 

least some portions of it, except in a more 
general manner. We maybe able to see that it 
indicates the most refined and exalted enjoyment, 
without knowing precisely in what that enjoyment 
consists, or from what it more immediately 
proceeds. But, perhaps the most satisfactory 
view that we can take of Heaven, is to consider 
it as including the perfection of our own nature, 
and the presence of every thing that is fitted to 
advance us from glory to glory. 

It is a delusion to which most men constantly 
yield, that happiness consists chiefly in the ability 
to command that which is without ; and hence 
the man who lives in opulence and honour, is 
regarded by the multitude as of course a happy 
man. But you may rest assured that, even in 
this life, happiness has chiefly to do with the 
world within: it is just in proportion as the 
faculties are kept in harmony with each other 
and the will of God — in other words, as the 
whole spiritual man is in a sound and healthful 
state, that there is a foundation for true happi- 
ness ; and it is because man is here, at best, so 
very imperfect a being, that the highest measure 
of bliss which he enjoys falls so far short of his 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH HEAVEN. 269 

original capabilities. But, in reaching Heaven, 
man attains to the perfection of his nature. 
His intellectual faculties — his perception, his 
memory, his imagination, his judgment, lose all 
the dimness and weakness that had pertained to 
them, and are endued with a vigour and energy 
that make him a wonder to himself, At the 
same time, his moral nature undergoes a corres- 
ponding exaltation : his conscience is always a 
minister of peace ; his affections and desires are 
endued with immortal purity and strength. The 
image of his Redeemer was faintly impressed 
upon his soul in the act of spiritual renovation ; 
and it became more and more distinct as he 
advanced in his pilgrimage ; but now it shines 
forth in complete and undisputed perfection. 
Time was when no one could say whether he 
would sink into a fiend or rise into an angel ; but 
it has turned out that he was destined to be a 
child of the skies, and to bear witness for his 
Redeemer forever, through his renovated nature. 
How different a being is man in Heaven, from 
man on earth ! How different is this weakness 
from that immortal strength — this darkness from 



270 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH HEAVEN. 

that surpassing light — this poverty of the mind 
from that ever enduring, ever increasing riches ! 

We have associated the body so much with 
the soul's exercises and enjoyments in this world, 
that it may require a severe effort, so to break 
away from the delusions of sense, as to realize 
that the soul can be advanced to this state of 
perfection, while the body is in the grave. Bui 
of the truth of this, God's holy word forbids us 
to doubt. The falling of the earthly tabernacle 
is the signal for the immortal spirit to burst forth 
in the energy of a new life, and to shine forth in 
the beauty of a new creation. The body moul- 
ders, and finally mingles with the clods of the 
valley. But it is there for a temporary slumber 
only. It is resting in hope until the great 
resurrection day. And then, as sure as there is 
energy in the archangel's voice, it will come forth, 
refashioned by the same hand that made it at first, 
into a body like unto Christ's glorious body, that 
will be a fit habitation for the already glorified 
spirit. And now that the union between the 
glorified soul and the glorified body is effected, 
we have the perfection of the whole man : the 
same being who lived on this earth, and whose 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH HEAVEN. 271 

faculties were accommodated to this lower state 
of existence, now lives in Heaven, with faculties 
fitted to subserve the great ends of his existence 
there. Oh judge not of man, from what you see 
him to be on earth — judge of him rather by what 
he is hereafter to be in Heaven. 

But we have not yet reached the full idea of Hea- 
ven ; for while it includes the exaltation and per- 
fection of man's nature, it includes also every thing 
that is necessary to meet the soul's desires, and to 
carry it forward through an endlessly progressive 
course of intelligence, purity and bliss. Notwith- 
standing the seat of enjoyment is in the soul, we 
know that even here, we are indebted for our 
happiness, in no small degree, to objects that are 
without us : as we contemplate the wonders of 
nature and providence, we find our knowledge 
constantly extending, and our admiration of the 
works and ways of God increasing. As we 
mingle in our social relations, and discharge the 
various obligations of justice and charity, and 
indulge in an intercommunication of thought and 
feeling in respect to the objects in which we 
are interested, our intellects expand, and our 
hearts warm, and our happiness is proportion- 



272 VIRTUE DROWNED WITH HEAVEN. 

ally increased. And the same general economy 
will prevail in Heaven. The glorified mind 
will be surrounded with glorious objects of 
contemplation ; new forms of intellectual and 
moral beauty, will rise up on every side to occupy 
and enrapture : new discoveries will be made con- 
tinually of the character, the government, the 
works, of God ; especially will the glory of the 
plan of redemption unfold with an ever increas- 
ing lustre ; and each step in the progress of 
discovery will mark a progressive enlargement of 
the soul's capacities, and will be a preparation for 
flights yet more lofty, for researches yet more 
profound, into the heights and depths of the divine 
perfections. And then what a communion will 
that be which the saint in Heaven shall enjoy with 
the various orders of existence with which Heaven 
is peopled ! How delightful must be the inter- 
course of glorified minds with each other ; how 
vigorous will be the operation of the social 
principle ; how free from every thing that em- 
bitters their communion here : how full of every 
thing that can render it profitable and joyous! 
The angels — the native inhabitants of Heaven — 
they too are the saint's companions ; and though 



VIRTUE CROWNED WITH HEAVEN. 273 

they belong to a higher order of existence than 
he. yet they consider it a privilege to be associated 
with him in searching into the mysteries of his 
redemption, and even in celebrating that event in 
the immortal song. Jesus the mediator of the 
new covenant — the brightness of the Father's 
glory and the express image of his person — tho 
man of sorrows exalted into a union with perfect 
Deity — He too will be there: and the saints 
will have free access to him. and intimate commun- 
ion with him ; and while he will receive their 
unceasing homage, he will crown them in return 
with his perpetual benedictions. But why should 
I attempt to penetrate the upper sanctuary ? I 
would be contented for the present to see through 
a glass darkly, in the hope that this darkness will 
ere long pass away, and that my spirit will be 
entraneed in the glory that is to follow. 

I cannot conclude this letter, and especially this 
series of letters, without admonishing you to be 
ware that you do not expect this glorious reward 
on any other terms than those which Christianity 
prescribes. There is indeed a spurious virtue — 
a virtue which expends itself upon the outer man, 

chiefly in adjusting and adorning the various 
15 



274 VIRTUE CROWNED WITH HEAVEN. 

social relations ; and it has its reward in a thou- 
sand ways, — all of which, however, have respect 
to the life that now is. You must look beyond 
the grace and the loveliness of nature, if you will 
travel in the path that terminates in Heaven. You 
must possess that virtue which is originated and 
nourished by an influence from the Redeemer's 
cross. You must realize that, as a sinner, you 
owe to God's justice a debt that you can never 
cancel; and that that debt will remain against 
you forever, unless you take advantage of that 
Heaven-devised provision which the gospel re- 
veals for securing to you a free forgiveness. In 
the exercise of sincere penitence for sin, you must 
welcome Christ as your Saviour, and desire and 
expect salvation only through the merit of his 
blood. In humble reliance on the Holy Spirit, 
you must devote yourself to the service of God f 
and aim continually at higher degrees of confor- 
mity to his will. This do, and you may, with 
perfect confidence, anticipate Heaven as your final 
home. 

My young friends, I here close the hints of 
admonition and counsel which I designed to 
address to you. I am willing to hope that it has 



VIRTUE CROWNED "WITH HEAVES. 275 

not been in vain that I have thus held up before 
you the amiable and exemplary Joseph. If I 
mistake not. the history has furnished a happy 
illustration of true religion, both as it exists in 
the heart, and as it is acted out in the life. 
Thankful indeed shall I be, if the perusal of what 
I have written shall render you more wise, or 
usefuL or happy, in the present life : but I own 
that my purpose will not be answered, if it shalJ 
not also exert an influence in reference to the 
higher interests of the life to come. I will only 
say, let your religion, as was that of Joseph, be 
the religion of principle, the religion of feeling, 
the religion of action — then will it accomplish 
in respect to you a perfect work, and make you 
all that you can reasonably desire to be in both 
worlds. Happy, thrice happy are ye, that your 
lot has been cast amidst the influences of our 
divine Christianity. Welcome, welcome this 
good angel to your heart, and she will guard 
you amidst all life's dangers, guide you amidst 
all life's perplexities, sustain you under all life's 
burdens, and finally accompany you in your 
upward flight, and remain the everlasting inmate 
of your bosom in brighter worlds. 



BOOKS PUBLISHED BY 

ERASTUS H. PEASE & CO., 
ALBANY, N. Y. 



SWEET'S PRACTICAL ELOCUTION, 

Designed as a Text and Reading Book in Common 
Schools and Higher Institutions. 

The author has carefully revised the work, and made 
some important additions. The first 54 pages comprise ob- 
servations on Elocution, a phonological exhibition of the 
elementary sounds of the English language, illustrations 
and examples for exercises in articulation, emphasis, 
quantity, climax, rhetorical pause, and inflections of the 
voice. The remaining 258 pages contain 137 pieces for 
exercise in reading and recitation, selected from the best 
and purest writings of the present and former agts. To 
furnish an agreeable variety of exercises for schools, a num- 
ber of pieces have been inserted, which are as suitable for 
singing as for elocutionary reading. 

But the peculiar feature of this work which pre-eminent- 
ly distinguishes it from all others on the subject, is the Ex- 
planatory Notes attached to each piece. These may be re- 
garded as the sine-qua-non — the indispensable condition of 
correct and elegant recitation, and of good reading. — Al- 
bany Argus. 

Extract from a Recommendation by S. W. Seton, Esq., 
Agent of the Public School Society of the City of New 
York. 

Having examined Mr. Sweet's work on Practical Elocu 
tion, I do not hesitate to express my favorable opinion of 
his system , believing it to be better adapted to common 
schools, and every purpose of rhetorical instruction, than 



2 E. H. PEASE & CO.'S PUBLICATIONS. 

any other. Being a natural system it cannot but be easily 
comprehended and practised. It is to be wished, that a 
system so true to nature may prevail and give the breath 
of life to the future orators of the American forum and 
senate. The selections for exercise, so far as I have exa- 
mined, seem worthy of approval, as tests of rhetorical skill, 
and a medium of pure moral impressions. The explana- 
tion of the subject of each extract is a useful guide and 
model in practice, and the teacher will find it easy to ex- 
tend still further such necessary descriptions previous to 
reading for recitation. 
New York } June, 1846. 

Recommendations have also been given by Rev. John 

Sessions, Alfred Conkling, R. Hyde Walworth, George 

W. Eaton, Asahel C. Kendrick, Ira Mayhew, William H. 

Seward, and others. 



THE LENTEN FAST; 

The History, Object and Proper Observance of the Holy 
Season of Lent, by Wm. Ingraham Kip, D. D. 

THE DEATH OF ABEL; 

Translated by Mary Collyer ; 24mo., cloth. A standard 
Poem of exquisite beauty. 

THE EVERY DAY BOOK OF CHRONOLOGY 
AND HISTORY, 

By J. Munsell, 2 vols. 12mo., sheep. 

THE LITTLE TARRY-AT-HOME TRAVELER'S 
OWN BOOK, 

Or, Scenes in Asia, for Amusement and Instruction, 

Accompaned with a Map of Asia. A charming little 
Book, beautiful type, and brought out in a pretty style. 

THE HEIDELBURG CATECHISM, 

With Explanatory Notes, by Dr. Snyder; stitched. 



E. H. PEASE & CO/S PUBLICATIONS 3 

SOW WELL AND HEAP WELL: 

Or. FIRESIDE EDUCATION. 

By S. G. Goodrich, author of Peter Parley's Tales. 
Third Edition. Albany: E. H. Pease $,* Co. 

This is the title of a neatly printed and well bound vo- 
lume of 343 pages, laid upon our table by the publishers. 
The name of the author of this excellent work is too well 
known to the friends of Education, both in this country and 
Europe, to require any thing more than a mere announce- 
ment of the book. It is eminently practical in all its sitg. 
gestions, and should be in the hands of every parent and 
teacher. 

We lmve only to present a few of the subjects consider- 
ed, to indicate the character of the work, to wit: '"' Provi- 
sion of Providence that the controlling lessons of life shall 
be given by parents. The Fireside. Obligations of pa- 
rents. Leading characteristics of children. Family Gov- 
ernment &c. There are but a few, even of the best edu- 
cated among parents or teachers, who would not be greatly 
benefited by this work, and we hope, for the welfare of 
society, that this book may be widely circulated and care- 
fully read. — Teachers Advocate. 



NOTTS LECTURES ON TEMPERANCE, 

By Eliphalet Nott, D. D., LL. D., PresH of Union 
College, 1 vol. lBmo., cloth. 

This work covers the whole ground and satisfactorily 
disposes of the difficulties of the question. 

THE CHILD'S FIRST BOOK OF READING 
AND DRAWING, 

By Jerome B Howard, Teacher of Drawing in tht 
State Normal School. 



4 E. H. PEASE & CO.'s PUBLICATIONS. 
CATECHISM OF 

AGRICULTURAL CHEMISTRY 

MJVJD GEOLOGTf: 

By James F. W. Johnston, M. A., F. R. SS. L. & E., 

with an Introduction by Prof. John Pitkin Norton, 
Yale College. 

RECOMMENDATIONS. 

From Hon. Samuel Young, Secretary of State and Super- 
intendent of Common Schools of the State ofN. York : 

I have carefully examined the Catechism of Professor 
Johnston, on Agriculture. It is the only scientific work on 
that subject I have ever seen, which by its shortness and 
simplicity is adapted to the capacity of children ; and which, 
on being illustrated by cheap and simple experiments, as 
he recommends, cannot fail to make a lasting impression 
on the juvenile mind. 

It gives the analysis of different piants, of animals and of 
soils, exhibiting the organic and inorganic substances of 
which they are composed, and teaching the important truth 
that vegetables derive a part of their nourishment from the 
air, and the remainder from the earth j that different vege- 
tables require different kinds of food, and in variable quan- 
tities; that the soil may be destitute of nutrition, for one 
kind of plant, and not for another; and the means are 
explained of supplying to an exhausted or meagre soil its 
deficiencies. It also gives the rationale of the dairy and 
the fattening of animals. 

This little work is the basis of both agricultural art and 
science. A knowledge of its principles is within the com- 
prehension of every child of twelve years old ; and if its 
truths were impressed on the minds of the young., a foun- 
dation would be laid for a vast improvement in that most 
important occupation which feeds and clothes the humafc 
face. Instead of conjecture and hazard, and doubt and ex- 
periment as heretofore, a knowledge of the composition of 



E. H. PEASE & CO.'S PUBLICATIONS. 



soils, the food of plants and the processes of nature in the 
culture and growth of crops, would elevate agriculture to 
a conspicuous rank among the exact sciences. 

I hope that parents will be willing to introduce this brief 
Catechism into the common schools of this State. 

Albany, Ulh January, 1845. S. YOUNG. 



THE LIFE AND TIMES OE COLUMBUS, 
A Book for the Young : 

Reprinted from the London Tract Society edition, ana 
revised and illustrated with appropriate mood cuts 
1 volume, 18mo. 

This work, although intended for youthful readers, and 
well fitted to interest and instruct them, will also be found 
eminently worthy the perusal of all. We have often 
thought that Irving's great Life of Columbus is too dif 
fuse and lengthy. Its interest is impaired by its prolixity. 
The present volume contains all the information of that 
celebrated work, combined with reflections, moral and re- 
ligious, which did not come within Irving's plan. It is a 
book which the reader cannot lay down till he has finished 
it, and to which he will recur again and again, with re- 
newed gratification. 

SELECT STORIES FOR CHILDREN, 

1 volume, 18mo., cloth gilt 

The prose stories contained in this work, are amusing, 
well told, and of salutary tendency, every thing objection- 
able in thought and expression having been sedulously 
excluded ; the pieces in verse are of a similar kind. It 
will be found of such a character as to interest young 
people, while it inculcates lessons of piety, benevolence 
and justice. It is respectfully recommended to the at- 
tention of parents, Sabbath School teachers, and all who 
are concerned in the training of the rising generation. 

i» 



6 E. H. PEASE & CO.'s PUBLICATIONS. 



LETTEKS TO YOUNG MEN : 

FOUNDED ON THE HISTORY OP JOSEPH ; 

By W. B. Sfrague, D. D. 1 volume 12mo., with, a 
Fine Steel Frontispiece. 

CONTENTS — OUTLINE OF THE HISTORY OF JOSEPH. 

Letter 1. Danger from excessive parental indulgence. 
2. Danger from injurious treatment. 3. Danger from being 
away from home. 4. Danger from living in a currupt 
state of society. 5. Danger of being suddenly cast into 
adversity. 6. Danger from being intrusted with the inte- 
rest of others. 7. Danger from coming into possession of 
great wealth. 8. Intregrity. 9. Diligence. 10. Econo- 
my. 11. Dignity. 12. Sympathy. 13. Forgiveness of 
Injuries. 14. Filial regard. 15. Dependence on God. 
16. Virtue crowned with safety. 17. Virtue crowned with 
peace. 18. Virtue crowned with riches. 19. Virtue 
crowned with honor. 20. Virtue crowned with usefulness. 
21. Virtue crowned with Heaven. 

The following letter though anonymous and peculiar, 
renders a testimonial to the value of Sprague's Letters to 
Young Men which we deem of great value. 

E. H. P. & Co. 

New York, May 18, 1847. 

Dear Sir — These few lines to the author of a book which 
has so perfectly enchanted the writer, I hope you will par- 
don. il Letters to Young Men founded upon the History 
of Joseph," is the work to which he refers. Thrice has he 
read it with the greatest delight, and sincerely does he 
trust , it may prove to him as great a future benefit — as it 
does a present gratification. If it produces such an effect, 
he is sure that the conditions therein prescribed nearly at 
the close of the final chapter, cannot fail of being realized. 
As a beautiful style of writing, he values and reveres it. 



E. H. PEASE & CO. S PUBLICATIONS. 7 

As a friend ana counsellor, lie loves and hears it. As 
a beacon, pointing to the shelving reef of vice — he regards 
and obeys it. And as a compass showing him continually 
how his frail vessel heads, bidding him to let go the anchor 
of faith when the intense fogs of adversity thicken around 
him, he cherishes and honors it. And blessed is the craft 
in human form — that shall at length arrive at the post of 
the Heavenly Jerusalem and see from a retrospective glance 
at the passage of life — that ' ' Sprague's Letters^ was a 
magnet , which exerted a mighty influence to keep him in 
the channel of virtue. 

Respectfully your humble serv't, 

A YOUNG MAN. 



LETTERS ON 
PRACTICAL SUBJECTS 

TO A DAUGHTER: 

By W. B. Sprague, D. D. 1 volume 12mo., with 
a Fine Steel Frontispiece. 

CONTENTS. 

1. Introduction. 2. Early Friendships. 3. Education 
— general directions. 4. Education — various branches. 5. 
Education — domestic economy. 6. General reading. 7. 
Independence of mind. 8. Forming the manners. 9. Con- 
versation. 10. Amusements. 11. Intercourse with the 
world. 12. Marriage. 13. Forming religious sentiments. 
14. Proper mode of treating religious error. 15. Practi- 
cal religion. 16. Self-knowledge. 17. Self-government. 
18. Humanity. 19. Devotion. 20. Christian benevolence. 
21. Christian zeal. 22. Improvement of time. 23. Pre- 
paration for death. 

Letters to Young Men, and Letters to a 
Daughter. By Rev. Wm. B . Sprague. The extensive 
dale of these two works, since their issue, is a sure war- 



8 E. H. PEASE & CO.'s PUBLICATIONS* 

rant for their excellence. The letters to Young Men are 
founded upon the most interesting passages in the history 
of Joseph, and inculcate many a noble principle of justice, 
honesty, morality, aud religion. The subject itself is one 
of surpassing interest, and, when touched by the polished 
pen of Dr. Sprague, becomes of interest to the most su- 
perficial reader. The Letters to a Daughter contain those 
principles which every parent would like to have a daughter 
acquire. The subject of female education has already been 
neglected too long, and we hail with joy this new edition 
of this valuable work from the pen of one of our best 
writers. The two works are well fitted to accompany 
each other, and should find a situation on many a parlor 
table throughout the country. If parents would have their 
children acquire good principles, let them place in their 
hands such books as these we have been describing. 



WORDS TO A 

YOUNG MAN'S CONSCIENCE : 

By a Father, An elegant miniature volume, gilt edges, 
bound in Bradley's best style. 

CONTENTS. 

The Forbidden Way— The Credulity of Unbelief— 
The Young Profligate's Grave. 

There are few men, either in America or England, who 
write the English language with more elegance than the 
Rev. Dr. Sprague, of Albany, who, we believe, is the au- 
thor of Words to a Young Man's Conscience ; and there 
are as few who could handle such a subject with so much 
point and gracefulness. This little gem of a volume 
seems formed to be carried in the bosom, as its lessons 
ought to be engraven on the heart. We know nothing 
within the same compass which would make a more pre- 
cious gift to a young man from an affectionate parent or 
Christian friend. 



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CHARLOTTE ELIZABETH'S 

JUVENILE BOOKS. 

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THE FLOWER ©F INNOCENCE, 

OR RACHEL : A True Narrative, 
WITH OTHER TALES: 

By Charlotte Elizabeth. 18mo, cloth gilt 

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duced . The story, or rather stories, are told with inimita- 
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impression upon any, especially a youthful, mind 



THE SDJPLE FLOWER, 

AND OTHER TALES: 

By Charlotte Elizabeth. 18mo., cloth gilt. 

The brightest flower that blooms is not more beautiful 
than " The Simple Flower," which opens and diffuses its 
fragrance throughout this volume. It is worthy of the 
gifted mind and the charming spirit that produced it. 



10 E. H. PEASE & CO. S PUBLICATIONS. 

TALES AND ILLUSTRATIONS, 

CHIEFLY INTENDED FOR YOUNG PERSONS: 

By Charlotte Elizabeth. ISmo., cloth gilt 

A beautiful contribution to that department of our reli- 
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culture of the young. As might be expected, it is full of 
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ALICE BENDEN, 

Or the Bowed Shilling, 
AND OTHER TALES: 

By Charlotte Elizabeth. 18mo., cloth gilt 

This little book is the production of a highly inventive 
as well as a highly cultivated and polished mind. It will 
prove, or rather, has already proved, a welcome offering 
to taste, intelligence and piety. 



GLIMPSES OF THE PAST, 

Or the Museum : 

By Charlotte Elizabeth. 18mo., cloth gilt 

Rarely is fiction more successfully made the vehicle of 
truth and wisdom, than in this unpretending work. It 
teaches the sublimest morality, in connection with some 
of the most interesting facts in the inspired record. The 
gifted pen that produced it has rarely done a better thing. 



E. H. PEASE & CO. S PUBLICATIONS. 1 1 

PHILIP AND HIS GARDEN, 

And Other Tales, 
SUITABLE FOR SABBATH SCHOOLS : 

By Charlotte Elizabeth 18?no., cloth gilt. 

An enchanting little volume, combining the most inno- 
cent entertainment with the most useful instruction. The 
writer is well nigh unequalled in her power to attract and 
interest the youthful mind. 



HUMILITY BEFORE HONOR, 

And other Tales and Illustrations : 

By Charlotte Elizabeth. With a Brief Memoir, 
by William B. Sprague, D. D. 18mo., cloth gilt 

This little volume, like everything from the same gifted 
source, is full of truth and life and beauty, and exhibits 
the true genius of Christianity, in its exaltation of the 
more retired and lowly virtues. It has never before been 
published in this country. 



THE FORTUNE TELLER, 

And Other Tales: 

By Charlotte Elizabeth. 18mo., cloth gilt. 

It is not easy to say whether there is most in this book 
to quicken the intellectual or the moral faculties. Such 
edifying and useful tales as these, ought to displace the 
immense amount of trash, under which the shelves of our 
booksellers groan, and to be read and pondered, as point- 
ing to duty, happiness and immortality. 



12 E. H. PEASE & CO.'S PUBLICATIONS. 



NOTES ON THE IROQUOIS : 

Or Contributions to American History, Antiquities and 
General Ethnology: by Henry R. Schoolcraft 
Albany : Erastus H. Pease tf Co. 

This elegant volume, by Schoolcraft, is attracting 
very general attention. It is one of the most valuable His- 
tories of the Indians of this State ever published. Its dis- 
tinguished author — whose life has been devoted to his theme 
— has thrown around this volume on irresistible charm. It 
should find its way to every well-chosen library, and should 
be read by every student of the history of the Red Man. It 
is an Albany book, published by E. H". Pease & Co., whose 
enterprise in the publishing department, is rapidly becom- 
ing known to authors. — Evening Journal. 

The usages of the Iroquois are exceedingly interesting ; 
long before our people had thought of a Revolution or a 
Confederation, the Iroquois wise men urged it upon our 
Colonies as a measure of salutary import, themselves having 
long experienced its benefit — and we with our Anglo-Saxon 
arrogance, call these men savages, from whom we unques- 
tionably received hints that gave the first impulse to our 
national greatness, our first meeting of Confederation being 
held within the light of the council fires of the Iroquois.— 
Literary World. 

The Red Man and the Pale Face owe to Henry Rowe 
Schoolcraft, a debt of gratitude, for adding so much as 
he has to the history of a race fast fading away. — Albany 
JLrgus. 



RECOLLECTIONS OP NETTLETON, 

AND THE 

GREAT REVIVAL OF 1820, 
By Rey. R. S. Smith. 1 vol, 18roo«, cloth. 

3477 7 






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